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in 


MOTHER 

ir  KATHLEEN  NORRIS 

\  girl's  story,  serving 
dnly  to  throw  light  upon 
big  mother  heart  that 
ats  in  the  background, 
irgaret  Paget  is  a  teacher, 
ed  of  her  humdrum  school 
periencesandall  that  goes 
make  up  her  colorless  life 
a  little  New  York  town. 
DW  the  sky  of  her  dreams 
ddenly  becomes  rosy, 
ly  to  precede  the  dawn 
a  "coming  true"  that 
ects  her  whole  life,  lends 
fairy-story  touch  that  is 
unterbalanced  by  the 
irdy  reality  of  struggle, 
crifice  and  resulting  peace 
d  power  that  are  the 
rtion  of  the  mother  who 
inches  eight  bodies  and 
nds  wholesomely  upon 
e  serious  business  of 
'ing. 


California  •  Berkeley 

fift  of 

E.    KIEBERT 


MOTHER 


BY  THE  AUTHOR  OF 

Poor,  Dear  Margaret  Kirby 
The  Rich  Mrs.  Burgoyne 

Saturday  s  Child 

The  Story  of  Julia  Page 

The  Treasure 


Oh,  Mother!"   sobbed  Margaret.     "Do  you  want  me  to  go?" 


MOTHER 

A     STORY 


BY 

KATHLEEN  NORRIS 


Illustrations  by 
F.   C.  YOHN 


NEW  YORK 

GROSSET  &  DUNLAP 

PUBLISHERS 


Copyright,  1911,  by 
DOUBLEDAY,  PAGE  &  COMPANY 

All  rights  reserved,  including  that  of 

translation  into  foreign  languages •, 

including  the  Scandinavian 


To 

J.  E.  T.  AND  J.  A.  T. 

As  years  ago  we  carried  to  your  knees 

The  tales  and  treasures  of  eventful  days, 

Knowing  no  deed  too  humble  for  your  praise, 

Nor  any  gift  too  trivial  to  please, 

So  still  we  bring,  with  older  smiles  and  tears, 

What  gifts  we  may,  to  claim  the  old,  dear  right; 

Your  faith,  beyond  the  silence  and  the  night, 

Your  love  still  close  and  watching  through  the  years. 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

"  Oh,  Mother!  "  sobbed  Margaret.     "  Do  you 

want  me  to  go?" Frontispiece 

FACING  PAGE 

With  notes    and  invitations,   account  books 
and  cheque  books,  dinner  lists  and  inter 
views  with  caterers,  decorators  and  florists, 
Margaret's  time  was  full. 76 

Like  a  pair  of  joyous  and  irresponsible  chil 
dren  .  .  .  too  happy  even  to  pause 
and  ask  themselves  whither  they  were  going  1 06 

"  Well,  there's  my  girl!     Bless  her  heart! "     .     134 

Leaning  on  the  uneven  stones     .     .     .     they 

looked  down  at  the  roofs  of  the  village      .     172 


MOTHER 


MOTHER 

CHAPTER  I 

WELL,  we  couldn't  have  much  worse 
weather  than  this  for  the  last  week 
of  school,  could  we?"  Margaret 
Paget  said  in  discouragement.  She  stood  at 
one  of  the  school  windows,  her  hands  thrust 
deep  in  her  coat  pockets  for  warmth,  her 
eyes  following  the  whirling  course  of  the 
storm  that  howled  outside.  The  day  had 
commenced  with  snow,  but  now,  at  twelve 
o'clock,  the  rain  was  falling  in  sheets,  and 
the  barren  schoolhouse  yard  and  the  play- 
shed  roof  ran  muddy  streams  of  water. 

Margaret  had  taught  in  this  schoolroom 
for  nearly  four  years  now,  ever  since  her 
seventeenth  birthday,  and  she  knew  every 
feature  of  the  big  bare  room  by  heart,  and 

3 


4  MOTHER 

every  detail  of  the  length  of  village  street 
that  the  high,  uncurtained  windows  com 
manded.  She  had  stood  at  this  window  in 
all  weathers:  when  locust  and  lilac  made 
even  ugly  little  Weston  enchanting,  and  all 
the  windows  were  open  to  floods  of  sweet 
spring  air;  when  the  dry  heat  of  autumn 
burned  over  the  world;  when  the  common 
little  houses  and  barns,  and  the  bare  trees, 
lay  dazzling  and  transfigured  under  the  first 
snowfall,  and  the  wood  crackled  in  the 
schoolroom  stove;  and  when,  as  to-day, 
mid-winter  rains  swept  drearily  past  the 
windows,  and  the  children  must  have  the 
lights  lighted  for  their  writing  lesson.  She 
was  tired  of  it  all,  with  an  utter  and  hopeless 
weariness.  Tired  of  the  bells,  and  the 
whispering,  and  the  shuffling  feet,  of  the 
books  that  smelled  of  pencil-dust  and  ink 
and  little  dusty  fingers;  tired  of  the  black 
boards,  cleaned  in  great  irregular  scallops 
by  small  and  zealous  arms;  of  the  clear- 
ticking  big  clock;  of  little  girls  who  sulked, 


MOTHER  5 

and  little  girls  who  cried  after  hours  in  the 
hall  because  they  had  lost  their  lunch  bas 
kets  or  their  overshoes,  and  little  girls  who 
had  colds  in  their  heads,  and  no  handker 
chiefs.  Looking  out  into  the  gray  day  and 
the  rain,  Margaret  'said  to  herself  that  she 
was  sick  of  it  all ! 

There  were  no  little  girls  in  the  school 
room  now.  They  were  for  the  most  part 
downstairs  in  the  big  pfayroom,  discussing 
cold  lunches,  and  planning,  presumably,  the 
joys  of  the  closely  approaching  holidays. 
One  or  two  windows  had  been  partially 
opened  to  air  the  room  in  their  absence,  and 
Margaret's  only  companion  was  another 
teacher,  Emily  Porter,  a  cheerful  little  widow, 
whose  plain  rosy  face  was  in  marked  contrast 
to  the  younger  woman's  unusual  beauty. 

Mrs.  Porter  loved  Margaret  and  admired 
her  very  much,  but  she  herself  loved  teach 
ing.  She  had  had  a  hard  fight  to  secure  this 
position  a  few  years  ago;  it  meant  comfort 
to  her  and  her  children,  and  it  still  seemed 


6  MOTHER 

to  her  a  miracle  of  God's  working,  after  her 
years  of  struggle  and  worry.  She  could  not 
understand  why  Margaret  wanted  anything 
better;  what  better  thing  indeed  could  life 
hold!  Sometimes,  looking  admiringly  at 
her  associate's  crown  of  tawny  braids,  at 
the  dark  eyes  and  the  exquisite  lines  of  mouth 
and  forehead,  Mrs.  Porter  would  find  her 
self  sympathetic  with  the  girl's  vague  dis 
content  and  longings,  to  the  extent  of  wish 
ing  that  some  larger  social  circle  than  that 
of  Weston  might  have  a  chance  to  appre 
ciate  Margaret  Paget's  beauty,  that  "some 
of  those  painters  who  go  crazy  over  girls 
not  half  as  pretty"  might  see  her.  But, 
after  all,  sensible  little  Mrs.  Porter  would 
say  to  herself,  Weston  was  a  "nice"  town, 
only  four  hours  from  New  York,  absolutely 
up-to-date;  and  Weston's  best  people  were 
all  "nice,"  and  the  Paget  girls  were  very 
popular,  and  "went  everywhere," — young 
people  were  just  discontented  and  exacting, 
that  was  all ! 


MOTHER  7 

She  came  to  Margaret's  side  now,  but 
toned  snugly  into  her  own  storm  coat,  and 
they  looked  out  at  the  rain  together.  Noth 
ing  alive  was  in  sight.  The  bare  trees 
tossed  in  the  wind,  and  a  garden  gate  half 
way  down  the  row  of  little  shabby  cottages 
banged  and  banged. 

"Shame — this  is  the  worst  yet!"  Mrs. 
Porter  said.  "You  aren't  going  home  to 
lunch  in  all  this,  Margaret?" 

"Oh,  I  don't  know,"  Margaret  said 
despondently.  "I'm  so  dead  that  I'd  make 
a  cup  of  tea  here  if  I  didn't  think  Mother 
would  worry  and  send  Julie  over  with  lunch." 

"I  brought  some  bread  and  butter — but 
not  much.  I  hoped  it  would  hold  up.  I 
hate  to  leave  Tom  and  Sister  alone  all 
day,"  Mrs.  Porter  said  dubiously.  "There's 
tea  and  some  of  those  bouillon  cubes  and 
some  crackers  left.  But  you're  so  tired,  I 
don't  know  but  what  you  ought  to  have  a 
hearty  lunch." 

"Oh,  I'm  not  hungry."   Margaret  dropped 


8  MOTHER 

into  a  desk,  put  her  elbows  on  it,  pushed 
her  hair  off  her  forehead.  The  other  woman 
saw  a  tear  slip  by  the  lowered,  long  lashes. 

"You're    exhausted,    aren't    you,    Mar 
garet?"  she  said  suddenly. 

The    little    tenderness    was    too    much. 
Margaret's  lip  shook. 

"Dead!"  she  said  unsteadily.  Presently 
she  added,  with  an  effort  at  cheerfulness, 
"I'm  just  cross,  I  guess,  Emily;  don't  mind 
me!  I'm  tired  out  with  examinations  and"- 
her  eyes  filled  again — "and  I'm  sick  of  wet 
cold  weather  and  rain  and  snow,"  she  added 
childishly.  "Our  house  is  full  of  muddy 
rubbers  and  wet  clothes!  Other  people  go 
places  and  do  pleasant  things,"  said  Mar 
garet,  her  breast  rising  and  falling  stormily; 
"but  nothing  ever  happens  to  us  except  bro 
ken  arms,  and  bills,  and  boilers  bursting,  and 
chicken-pox!  It's  drudge,  drudge,  drudge, 
from  morning  until  night!" 

With  a  sudden  little  gesture  of  abandon 
ment  she  found  a  handkerchief  in  her  belt, 


MOTHER  9 

and  pressed  it,  still  folded,  against  her  eyes. 
Mrs.  Porter  watched  her  solicitously  but 
silently.  Outside  the  schoolroom  windows 
the  wind  battered  furiously,  and  rain 
slapped  steadily  against  the  panes. 

"Well!"  the  girl  said  resolutely  and  sud 
denly.  And  after  a  moment  she  added 
frankly,  "I  think  the  real  trouble  to-day, 
Emily,  is  that  we  just  heard  of  Betty  For- 
sythe's  engagement— she  was  my  brother's 
girl,  you  know;  he's  admired  her  ever  since 
she  got  into  High  School,  and  of  course 
Bruce  is  going  to  feel  awfully  bad." 

"  Betty  engaged  ?  Who  to  ?"  Mrs.  Porter 
was  interested. 

"To  that  man — boy,  rather,  he's  only 
twenty-one — who's  been  visiting  the  Red 
mans,"  Margaret  said.  "She's  only  known 
him  two  weeks." 

"  Gracious !    And  she's  only  eighteen " 

"Not  quite  eighteen.  She  and  my  sis 
ter,  Julie,  were  in  my  first  class  four  years 
ago;  they're  the  same  age,"  Margaret  said. 


io  MOTHER 

"She  came  fluttering  over  to  tell  us  last 
night,  wearing  a  diamond  the  size  of  a 
marble!  Of  course"  —Margaret  was  loyal 

•"I  don't  think  there's  a  jealous  bone  in 
Julie's  body;  still,  it's  pretty  hard!  Here's 
Julie  plugging  away  to  get  through  the 
Normal  School,  so  that  she  can  teach  all  the 
rest  of  her  life,  and  Betty's  been  to  Cali 
fornia,  and  been  to  Europe,  and  now  is 
going  to  marry  a  rich  New  York  man! 
Betty's  the  only  child,  you  know,  so,  of 
course,  she  has  everything.  It  seems  so 
unfair,  for  Mr.  Forsythe's  salary  is  exactly 
what  Dad's  is;  yet  they  can  travel,  and  keep 
two  maids,  and  entertain  all  the  time! 
And  as  for  family,  why,  Mother's  family 
is  one  of  the  finest  in  the  country,  and  Dad's 
had  two  uncles  who  were  judges — and  what 
were  the  Forsythes !  However  "  —Margaret 
dried  her  eyes  and  put  away  her  handker 
chief — "however,  it's  for  Bruce  I  mind 
most!" 

"  Bruce  is  only  three  years  older  than  you 


MOTHER  ii 

are,  twenty-three  or  four,"  Mrs.  Porter 
smiled. 

"Yes,  but  he's  not  the  kind  that  forgets!" 
Margaret's  flush  was  a  little  resentful.  "Oh, 
of  course,  you  can  laugh,  Emily.  I  know 
that  there  are  plenty  of  people  who  don't 
mind  dragging  along  day  after  day,  working 
and  eating  and  sleeping — but  I'm  not  that 
kind!"  she  went  on  moodily.  "I  used  to 
hope  that  things  would  be  different;  it 
makes  me  sick  to  think  how  brave  I  was; 
but  now  here's  Ju  coming  along  and  Ted 
growing  up,  and  Bruce's  girl  throwing  him 
over — it's  all  so  unfair  !  I  look  at  the  Cutter 
girls,  nearly  fifty,  and  running  the  post- 
office  for  thirty  years,  and  Mary  Page  in 
the  Library,  and  the  Norberrys  painting 
pillows — and  I  could  scream!" 

"Things  will  take  a  turn  for  the  better 
some  day,  Margaret,"  said  the  other  woman, 
soothingly;  "and  as  time  goes  on  you'll 
find  yourself  getting  more  and  more  pleasure 
out  of  your  work,  as  I  do.  Why,  I've  never 


12  MOTHER 

been  so  securely  happy  in  my  life  as  I  am 
now.  You'll  feel  differently  some  day." 

"Maybe,"  Margaret  assented  unenthusi 
astically.  There  was  a  pause.  Perhaps 
the  girl  was  thinking  that  to  teach  school, 
live  in  a  plain  little  cottage  on  the  unfash 
ionable  Bridge  Road,  take  two  roomers,  and 
cook  and  sew  and  plan  for  Tom  and  little 
Emily,  as  Mrs.  Porter  did,  was  not  quite  an 
ideal  existence. 

"  You're  an  angel,  anyway,  Emily,"  said 
she,  affectionately,  a  little  shamefacedly. 
"Don't  mind  my  growling.  I  don't  do  it 
very  often.  But  I  look  about  at  other 
people,  and  then  realize  how  my  mother's 
slaved  for  twenty  years  and  how  my  father's 
been  tied  down,  and  I've  come  to  the  con 
clusion  that  while  there  may  have  been  a 
time  when  a  woman  could  keep  a  house, 
tend  a  garden,  sew  and  spin  and  raise  twelve 
children,  things  are  different  now;  life  is 
more  complicated.  You  owe  your  husband 
something,  you  owe  yourself  something.  I 


MOTHER  13 

want  to  get  on,  to  study  and  travel,  to  be  a 
companion  to  my  husband.  I  don't  want 
to  be  a  mere  upper  servant!" 

"No,  of  course  not,"  assented  Mrs.  Por 
ter,  vaguely,  soothingly. 

"Well,  if  we  are  going  to  stay  here,  I'll 
light  the  stove,"  Margaret  said  after  a 
pause.  "B-r-r-r!  this  room  gets  cold  with 
the  windows  open!  I  wonder  why  Kelly 
doesn't  bring  us  more  wood?" 

"I  guess— I'll  stay!"  Mrs.  Porter  said 
uncertainly,  following  her  to  the  big  book 
closet  off  the  schoolroom,  where  a  little  gas 
stove  and  a  small  china  closet  occupied  one 
wide  shelf.  The  water  for  the  tea  and 
bouillon  was  put  over  the  flame  in  a  tiny 
enamelled  saucepan;  they  set  forth  on  a 
fringed  napkin  crackers  and  sugar  and 
spoons. 

At  this  point  a  small  girl  of  eleven  with  a 
brilliant,  tawny  head,  and  a  wide  and  tooth 
less  smile,  opened  the  door  cautiously,  and 
said,  blinking  rapidly  with  excitement — 


i4  MOTHER 

"Mark,  Mother  theth  pleath  may  thee 
come  in?" 

This  was  Rebecca,  one  of  Margaret's  five 
younger  brothers  and  sisters,  and  a  pupil  of 
the  school  herself.  Margaret  smiled  at  the 
eager  little  face. 

"Hello,  darling!  Is  Mother  here?  Cer 
tainly  she  can!  I  believe" — she  said,  turn 
ing,  suddenly  radiant,  to  Mrs.  Potter — 
"I'll  just  bet  you  she's  brought  us  some 
lunch!" 

"Thee  brought  uth  our  luncheth — eggth 
and  thpith  caketh  and  everything!"  exulted 
Rebecca,  vanishing,  and  a  moment  later 
Mrs.  Paget  appeared. 

She  was  a  tall  woman,  slender  but  large 
of  build,  and  showing,  under  a  shabby  rain 
coat  and  well  pinned-up  skirt,  the  gracious 
generous  lines  of  shoulders  and  hips,  the 
deep-bosomed  erect  figure  that  is  rarely 
seen  except  in  old  daguerreotypes,  or  the 
ideal  of  some  artist  two  generations  ago. 
The  storm  to-day  had  blown  an  unusual 


MOTHER  15 

color  into  her  thin  cheeks,  her  bright,  deep 
eyes  were  like  Margaret's,  but  the  hair  that 
once  had  shown  an  equally  golden  lustre 
was  dull  and  smooth  now,  and  touched  with 
gray.  She  came  in  smiling,  and  a  little 
breathless. 

"Mother,  you  didn't  come  out  in  all  this 
rain  just  to  bring  us  our  lunches!"  Margaret 
protested,  kissing  the  cold,  fresh  face. 

"Well,  look  at  the  lunch  you  silly  girls 
were  going  to  eat!"  Mrs.  Paget  protested 
in  turn,  in  a  voice  rich  with  amusement. 
"I  love  to  walk  in  the  rain,  Mark;  I  used  to 
love  it  when  I  was  a  girl.  Tom  and  Sister 
are  at  our  house,  Mrs.  Porter,  playing  with 
Duncan  and  Baby.  Pll  keep  them  until 
after  school,  then  I'll  send  them  over  to 
walk  home  with  you." 

"Oh,  you  are  an  angel!"  said  the  younger 
mother,  gratefully.  And  "You  are  an 
angel,  Mother!"  Margaret  echoed,  as  Mrs. 
Paget  opened  a  shabby  suitcase,  and  took 
from  it  a  large  jar  of  hot  rich  soup,  a  little 


16  MOTHER 

blue  bowl  of  stuffed  eggs,  half  a  fragrant 
whole-wheat  loaf  in  a  white  napkin,  a  little 
glass  full  of  sweet  butter,  and  some  of  the 
spice  cakes  to  which  Rebecca  had  already 
enthusiastically  alluded. 

"There!"  said  she,  pleased  with  their 
delight,  "now  take  your  time,  you've  got 
three-quarters  of  an  hour.  Julie  devilled 
the  eggs,  and  the  sweet-butter  man  happened 
to  come  just  as  I  was  starting." 

"Delicious!  You've  saved  our  lives," 
Margaret  said,  busy  with  cups  and  spoons. 
"You'll  stay,  Mother?"  she  broke  off  sud 
denly,  as  Mrs.  Paget  closed  the  suitcase. 

"I  can't,  dear!  I  must  go  back  to  the 
children,"  her  mother  said  cheerfully.  No 
coaxing  proving  of  any  avail,  Margaret 
went  with  her  to  the  top  of  the  hall  stairs. 

"What's  my  girl  worrying  about?"  Mrs. 
Paget  asked,  with  a  keen  glance  at  Mar 
garet's  face. 

"Oh,  nothing!"  Margaret  used  both 
hands  to  button  the  top  button  of  her 


MOTHER  17 

mother's  coat.  "I  was  hungry  and  cold, 
and  I  didn't  want  to  walk  home  in  the  rain!" 
she  confessed,  raising  her  eyes  to  the  eyes 
so  near  her  own. 

"Well,  go  back  to  your  lunch,"  Mrs. 
Paget  urged,  after  a  brief  pause,  not  quite 
satisfied  with  the  explanation.  Margaret 
kissed  her  again,  watched  her  descend  the 
stairs,  and  leaning  over  the  banister  called 
down  to  her  softly: 

"Don't  worry  about  me,  Mother!" 

"No — no — no!"  her  mother  called  back 
brightly.  Indeed,  Margaret  reflected,  go 
ing  back  to  the  much-cheered  Emily,  it 
was  not  in  her  nature  to  worry. 

No,  Mother  never  worried,  or  if  she  did, 
nobody  ever  knew  it.  Care,  fatigue,  re 
sponsibility,  hard  long  years  of  busy  days 
and  broken  nights  had  left  their  mark  on  her 
face;  the  old  beauty  that  had  been  hers  was 
chiselled  to  a  mere  pure  outline  now;  but 
there  was  a  contagious  serenity  in  Mrs. 
Paget's  smile,  a  clear  steadiness  in  her  calm 


i 8  MOTHER 

eyes,  and  her  forehead,  beneath  an  unfash- 
ionably  plain  sweep  of  hair,  was  untroubled 
and  smooth. 

The  children's  mother  was  a  simple 
woman;  so  absorbed  in  the  hourly  problems 
attendant  upon  the  housing  and  feeding  of 
her  husband  and  family  that  her  own  per 
sonal  ambitions,  if  she  had  any,  were  quite 
lost  sight  of,  and  the  actual  outlines  of  her 
character  were  forgotten  by  every  one,  her 
self  included.  If  her  busy  day  marched 
successfully  to  nightfall;  if  darkness  found 
her  husband  reading  in  his  big  chair,  the 
younger  children  sprawled  safe  and  asleep 
in  the  shabby  nursery,  the  older  ones  con 
tented  with  books  or  games,  the  clothes 
sprinkled,  the  bread  set,  the  kitchen  dark 
and  clean;  Mrs.  Paget  asked  no  more  of 
life.  She  would  sit,  her  overflowing  work- 
basket  beside  her,  looking  from  one  absorbed 
face  to  another,  thinking  perhaps  of  Julie's 
new  school  dress,  of  Ted's  impending  siege 
with  the  dentist,  or  of  the  old  bureau  up  attic 


MOTHER  19 

that  might  be  mended  for  Bruce's  room. 
"Thank  God  we  have  all  warm  beds,"  she 
would  say,  when  they  all  went  upstairs, 
yawning  and  chilly. 

She  had  married,,  at  twenty,  the  man  she 
loved,  and  had  found  him  better  than  her 
dreams  in  many  ways,  and  perhaps  dis 
appointing  in  some  few  others,  but  "the 
best  man  in  the  world"  for  all  that.  That 
for  more  than  twenty  years  he  had  been  sat 
isfied  to  stand  for  nine  hours  daily  behind 
one  dingy  desk,  and  to  carry  home  to  her 
his  unopened  salary  envelope  twice  a  month, 
she  found  only  admirable.  Daddy  was 
"steady,"  he  was  "so  gentle  with  the 
children,"  he  was  "the  easiest  man  in  the 
world  to  cook  for."  "Bless  his  heart,  no 
woman  ever  had  less  to  worry  over  in  her 
husband!"  she  would  say,  looking  from  her 
kitchen  window  to  the  garden  where  he 
trained  the  pea-vines,  with  the  children's 
yellow  heads  bobbing  about  him.  She 
never  analyzed  his  character,  much  less 


20  MOTHER 

criticised  him.  Good  and  bad,  he  was 
taken  for  granted ;  she  was  much  more  leni 
ent  to  him  than  to  any  of  the  children.  She 
welcomed  the  fast-coming  babies  as  gifts 
from  God,  marvelled  over  their  tiny  perfect- 
ness,  dreamed  over  the  soft  relaxed  little 
forms  with  a  heart  almost  too  full  for  prayer. 
She  was,  in  a  word,  old-fashioned,  hope 
lessly  out  of  the  modern  current  of  thoughts 
and  events.  She  secretly  regarded  her 
children  as  marvellous,  even  while  she 
laughed  down  their  youthful  conceit  and 
punished  their  naughtiness. 

Thinking  a  little  of  all  these  things,  as  a 
girl  with  her  own  wifehood  and  motherhood 
all  before  her  does  think,  Margaret  went 
back  to  her  hot  luncheon.  One  o'clock 
found  her  at  her  desk,  refreshed  in  spirit 
by  her  little  outburst,  and  much  fortified 
in  body.  The  room  was  well  aired,  and  a 
reinforced  fire  roared  in  the  little  stove. 
One  of  the  children  had  brought  her  a  spray 


MOTHER  21 

of  pine,  and  the  spicy  fragrance  of  it  re 
minded  her  that  Christmas  and  the  Christ 
mas  vacation  were  near;  her  mind  was  pleas 
antly  busy  with  anticipation  of  the  play  that 
the  Pagets  always  wrote  and  performed 
some  time  during  the  holidays,  and  with  the 
New  Year's  costume  dance  at  the  Hall,  and 
a  dozen  lesser  festivities. 

Suddenly,  in  the  midst  of  a  droning  spell 
ing  lesson,  there  was  a  jarring  interruption. 
From  the  world  outside  came  a  child's  shrill 
screaming,  which  was  instantly  drowned 
in  a  chorus  of  frightened  voices,  and  in  the 
schoolroom  below  her  own  Margaret  heard 
a  thundering  rush  of  feet,  and  answering 
screams.  With  a  suffocating  terror  at  her 
heart  she  ran  to  the  window,  followed  by 
every  child  in  the  room. 

The  rain  had  stopped  now,  and  the  sky 
showed  a  pale,  cold,  yellow  light  low  in  the 
west.  At  the  schoolhouse  gate  an  immense 
limousine  car  had  come  to  a  stop.  The 
driver,  his  face  alone  visible  between  a  great 


22  MOTHER 

leather  coat  and  visored  leather  cap,  was 
talking  unheard  above  the  din.  A  tall 
woman,  completely  enveloped  in  sealskins, 
had  evidently  jumped  from  the  limousine, 
and  now  held  in  her  arms  what  made  Mar 
garet's  heart  turn  sick  and  cold,  the  limp 
figure  of  a  small  girl. 

About  these  central  figures  there  surged 
the  terrified  crying  small  children  of  the 
just-dismissed  primer  class,  and  in  the  half 
moment  that  Margaret  watched,  Mrs.  Por 
ter,  white  and  shaking,  and  another  teacher, 
Ethel  Elliot,  an  always  excitable  girl,  who  was 
now  sobbing  and  chattering  hysterically,  ran 
out  from  the  school,  each  followed  by  her  own 
class  of  crowding  and  excited  boys  and  girls. 

With  one  horrified  exclamation,  Mar 
garet  ran  downstairs,  and  out  to  the  gate. 
Mrs.  Porter  caught  at  her  arm  as  she  passed 
her  in  the  path. 

"Oh,  my  God,  Margaret!  It's  poor  little 
Dorothy  Scott !"  she  said.  "They've  killed 
her.  The  car  went  completely  over  her!" 


MOTHER  23 

"Oh,  Margaret,  don't  go  near,  oh,  how 
can  you!"  screamed  Miss  Elliot.  "Oh,  and 
she's  all  they  have !  Who'll  tell  her  mother ! " 

With  astonishing  ease,  for  the  children 
gladly  recognized  authority,  Margaret 
pushed  through  the  group  to  the  motor-car. 

"Stop  screaming — stop  that  shouting  at 
once — keep  still,  every  one  of  you!"  she 
said  angrily,  shaking  various  shoulders  as 
she  went  with  such  good  effect  that  the 
voice  of  the  woman  in  sealskins  could  be 
heard  by  the  time  Margaret  reached  her. 

"I  don't  think  she's  badly  hurt!"  said 
this  woman,  nervously  and  eagerly.  She 
was  evidently  badly  shaken,  and  was  very 
white.  "Do  quiet  them,  can't  you?"  she 
said,  with  a  sort  of  apprehensive  impatience. 
"Can't  we  take  her  somewhere,  and  get  a 
doctor?  Can't  we  get  out  of  this  ?" 

Margaret  took  the  child  in  her  own  arms. 
Little  Dorothy  roared  afresh,  but  to  Mar 
garet's  unspeakable  relief  she  twisted  about 
and  locked  her  arms  tightly  about  the  loved 


24  MOTHER 

teacher's  neck.  The  other  woman  watched 
them  anxiously. 

"That  blood  on  her  frock's  just  nose 
bleed/'  she  said;  "but  I  think  the  car  went 
over  her!  I  assure  you  we  were  running 

very  slowly.  How  it  happened !  But 

I  don't  think  she  was  struck." 

"Nosebleed!"  Margaret  echoed,  with  a 
great  breath.  "No,"  she  said  quietly,  over 
the  agitated  little  head;  "I  don't  think  she's 
much  hurt.  We'll  take  her  in.  Now,  look 
here,  children,"  she  added  loudly  to  the  as 
sembled  pupils  of  the  Weston  Grammar 
School,  whom  mere  curiosity  had  somewhat 
quieted,  "I  want  every  one  of  you  children 
to  go  back  to  your  schoolrooms;  do  you 
understand?  Dorothy's  had  a  bad  scare, 
but  she's  got  no  bones  broken,  and  we're 
going  to  have  a  doctor  see  that  she's  all 
right.  I  want  you  to  see  how  quiet  you  can 
be.  Mrs.  Porter,  may  my  class  go  into 
your  room  a  little  while?" 

"Certainly,"  said  Mrs.  Porter,  eager  to 


MOTHER  25 

cooperate,  and  much  relieved  to  have  her 
share  of  the  episode  take  this  form.  "  Form 
lines,  children,"  she  added  calmly. 

"Ted,"  said  Margaret  to  her  own  small 
brother,  who  was  one  of  Mrs.  Porter's 
pupils,  and  who  had  edged  closer  to  her  than 
any  boy  unprivileged  by  relationship  dared, 
"will  you  go  down  the  street,  and  ask  old 
Doctor  Potts  to  come  here?  And  then  go 
tell  Dorothy's  mother  that  Dorothy  has  had 
a  little  bump,  and  that  Miss  Paget  says 
she's  all  right,  but  that  she'd  like  her  mother 
to  come  for  her." 

"Sure  I  will,  Mark!"  Theodore  responded 
enthusiastically,  departing  on  a  run. 

"Mama!"  sobbed  the  little  sufferer  at 
this  point,  hearing  a  familiar  word. 

"Yes,  darling,  you  want  Mama,  don't 
you?"  Margaret  said  soothingly,  as  she 
started  with  her  burden  up  the  schoolhouse 
steps.  "What  were  you  doing,  Dorothy," 
she  went  on  pleasantly,  "to  get  under  that 
big  car?" 


26  MOTHER 

"I  dropped  my  ball!"  wailed  the  small 
girl,  her  tears  beginning  afresh,  "and  it 
rolled  and  rolled.  And  I  didn't  see  the 
automobile,  and  I  didn't  see  it!  And  I  fell 
down  and  b-b-bumped  my  nose!" 

"Well,  I  should  think  you  did!"  Mar 
garet  said,  laughing.  "  Mother  won't  know 
you  at  all  with  such  a  muddy  face  and  such 
a  muddy  apron!" 

Dorothy  laughed  shakily  at  this,  and 
several  other  little  girls,  passing  in  orderly 
file,  laughed  heartily.  Margaret  crossed 
the  lines  of  children  to  the  room  where  they 
played  and  ate  their  lunches  on  wet  days. 
She  shut  herself  in  with  the  child  and  the 
fur-clad  lady. 

"Now  you're  all  right!"  said  Margaret, 
gayly.  And  Dorothy  was  presently  com 
fortable  in  a  big  chair,  wrapped  in  a  rug 
from  the  motor-car,  with  her  face  washed, 
and  her  head  dropped  languidly  back 
against  her  chair,  as  became  an  interesting 
invalid.  The  Irish  janitor  was  facetious 


MOTHER  27 

as  he  replenished  the  fire,  and  made  her 
laugh  again.  Margaret  gave  her  a  numeri 
cal  chart  to  play  with,  and  saw  with  satis 
faction  that  the  little  head  was  bent  inter 
estedly  over  it. 

Quiet  fell  upon  the  school;  the  muffled 
sound  of  lessons  recited  in  concert  presently 
reached  them.  Theodore  returned,  report 
ing  that  the  doctor  would  come  as  soon  as 
he  could  and  that  Dorothy's  mother  was 
away  at  a  card-party,  but  that  Dorothy's 
"girl"  would  come  for  her  as  soon  as  the 
bread  was  out  of  the  oven.  There  was 
nothing  to  do  but  wait. 

"It  seems  a  miracle,"  said  the  strange 
lady,  in  a  low  tone,  when  she  and  Margaret 
were  alone  again  with  the  child.  "But  I 
don't  believe  she  was  scratched!" 

"I  don't  think  so,"  Margaret  agreed. 
"Mother  says  no  child  who  can  cry  is  very 
badly  hurt." 

"They  made  such  a  horrible  noise,"  said 
the  other,  sighing  wearily.  She  passed  a 


28  MOTHER 

white  hand,  with  one  or  two  blazing  great 
stones  upon  it,  across  her  forehead.  Mar 
garet  had  leisure  now  to  notice  that  by  all 
signs  this  was  a  very  great  lady  indeed. 
The  quality  of  her  furs,  the  glimpse  of  her 
gown  that  the  loosened  coat  showed,  her 
rings,  and  most  of  all  the  tones  of  her  voice, 
the  authority  of  her  manner,  the  well- 
groomed  hair  and  skin  and  hands,  all 
marked  the  thoroughbred. 

"Do  you  know  that  you  managed  that 
situation  very  cleverly  just  now?"  said  the 
lady,  with  a  keen  glance  that  made  Margaret 
color.  "One  has  such  a  dread  of  the  crowd, 
just  public  sentiment,  you  know.  Some 
officious  bystander  calls  the  police,  they 
crowd  against  your  driver,  perhaps  a  brick 
gets  thrown.  We  had  an  experience  in 
England  once She  paused,  then  in 
terrupted  herself.  "  But  I  don't  know  your 
name?"  she  said  brightly. 

Margaret  supplied  it,  was  led  to  talk  a 
little  of  her  own  people. 


MOTHER  29 

"Seven  of  you,  eh?  Seven's  too  many," 
said  the  visitor,  with  the  assurance  that 
Margaret  was  to  learn  characterized  her. 
"I've  two  myself,  two  girls,"  she  went  on. 
"I  wanted  a  boy,  but  they're  nice  girls. 
And  you've  six  brothers  and  sisters?  Are 
they  all  as  handsome  as  you  and  this  Teddy 
of  yours?  And  why  do  you  like  teaching?" 

"Why  do  I  like  it?"  Margaret  said,  en 
joying  these  confidences  and  the  unusual 
experience  of  sitting  idle  in  mid-afternoon. 
"I  don't,  I  hate  it." 

"I  see.  But  then  why  don't  you  come 
down  to  New  York,  and  do  something  else?" 
the  other  woman  asked. 

"I'm  needed  at  home,  and  I  don't  know 
any  one  there,"  Margaret  said  simply. 

"I  see,"  the  lady  said  again  thoughtfully. 
There  was  a  pause.  Then  the  same  speaker 
said  reminiscently,  "I  taught  school  once 
for  three  months  when  I  was  a  girl,  to  show 
my  father  I  could  support  myself." 

"  I've  taught  for  four  years,"  Margaret  said. 


3o  MOTHER 

"Well,  if  you  ever  want  to  try  something 
else — there  are  such  lots  of  fascinating 
things  a  girl  can  do  now — be  sure  you  come 
and  see  me  about  it,"  the  stranger  said. 
"I  am  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt,  of  New  York." 

Margaret's  amazed  eyes  flashed  to  Mrs. 
Carr-Boldt's  face;  her  cheeks  crimsoned. 

"Mrs.  Carr-Boldt!"  she  echoed  blankly. 

"Why  not?"  smiled  the  lady,  not  at  all 
displeased. 

"Why,"  stammered  Margaret,  laughing 
and  rosy,  "why,  nothing — only  I  never 
dreamed  who  you  were!"  she  finished,  a 
little  confused. 

And  indeed  it  never  afterward  seemed  to 
her  anything  short  of  a  miracle  that  brought 
the  New  York  society  woman — famed  on 
two  continents  and  from  ocean  to  ocean  for 
her  jewels,  her  entertainments,  her  gowns, 
her  establishments — into  a  Weston  school 
room,  and  into  Margaret  Paget's  life. 

"I  was  on  my  way  to  New  York  now," 
said  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt. 


MOTHER  31 

"I  don't  see  why  you  should  be  delayed," 
Margaret  said,  glad  to  be  able  to  speak 
normally,  with  such  a  fast-beating  and 
pleasantly  excited  heart.  "I'm  sure  Dor 
othy's  all  right." 

"Oh,  I'd  rather  wait.  I  like  my  com 
pany,"  said  the  other.  And  Margaret 
decided  in  that  instant  that  there  never  was 
a  more  deservedly  admired  and  copied  and 
quoted  woman. 

Presently  their  chat  was  interrupted  by 
the  tramp  of  the  departing  school  schildren; 
the  other  teachers  peeped  in,  were  reassured, 
and  went  their  ways.  Then  came  the  doc 
tor,  to  pronounce  the  entirely  cheerful  Dor 
othy  unhurt,  and  to  bestow  upon  her  some 
hoarhound  drops.  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  settled 
at  once  with  the  doctor,  and  when  Margaret 
saw  the  size  of  the  bill  that  was  pressed 
into  his  hand,  she  realized  that  she  had  done 
her  old  friend  a  good  turn. 

"Use  it  up  on  your  poor  people,"  said 
Mrs.  Carr-Boldt,  to  his  protestations;  and 


32  MOTHER 

when  he  had  gone,  and  Dorothy's  "girl"  ap 
peared,  she  tipped  that  worthy  and  amazed 
Teuton,  and  after  promising  Dorothy  a  big 
doll  from  a  New  York  shop,  sent  the  child 
and  maid  home  in  the  motor-car. 

"I  hope  this  hasn't  upset  your  plans," 
Margaret  said,  as  they  stood  waiting  in  the 
doorway.  It  was  nearly  five  o'clock,  the 
school  was  empty  and  silent. 

"No,  not  exactly.  I  had  hoped  to  get 
home  for  dinner.  But  I  think  I'll  get  Wool- 
cock  to  take  me  back  to  Dayton;  I've  some 
very  dear  friends  there  who'll  give  me  a  cup 
of  tea.  Then  I'll  come  back  this  way  and 
get  home,  by  ten,  I  should  think,  for  a  late 
supper."  Then,  as  the  limousine  appeared, 
Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  took  both  Margaret's  hands 
in  hers,  and  said,  "And  now  good-bye,  my 
dear  girl.  I've  got  your  address,  and  I'm  go 
ing  to  send  you  something  pretty  to  remem 
ber  me  by.  You  saved  me  from  I  don't  know 
what  annoyance  and  publicity.  And  don't 
forget  that  when  you  come  to  New  York 


MOTHER  33 

I'm  going  to  help  you  meet  the  people 
you  want  to,  and  give  you  a  start  if  I  can. 
You're  far  too  clever  and  good-look 
ing  to  waste  your  life  down  here.  Good 
bye!" 

"Good-bye!"  Margaret  said,  her  cheeks 
brilliant,  her  head  awhirl. 

She  stood  unmindful  of  the  chilly  evening 
air,  watching  the  great  motor-car  wheel  and 
slip  into  the  gloom.  The  rain  was  over;  a 
dying  wind  moaned  mysteriously  through 
the  dusk.  Margaret  went  slowly  upstairs, 
pinned  on  her  hat,  buttoned  her  long  coat 
snugly  about  her.  She  locked  the  school 
room  door,  and,  turning  the  corner,  plunged 
her  hands  into  her  pockets,  and  faced  the 
wind  bravely.  Deepening  darkness  and 
coldness  were  about  her,  but  she  felt  sur 
rounded  by  the  warmth  and  brightness  of 
her  dreams.  She  saw  the  brilliant  streets 
of  a  big  city,  the  carriages  and  motor-cars 
coming  and  going,  the  idle,  lovely  women 
in  their  sumptuous  gowns  and  hats.  These 


34  MOTHER 

things  were  real,  near — almost  attainable — 
to-night. 

"Mrs.  Carr-Boldt!"  Margaret  said,  "the 
darling!  I  wonder  if  I'll  ever  see  her 
again!" 


CHAPTER  II 

EE  in  the  shabby,  commonplace  house 
that  sheltered  the  Paget  family 
sometimes  really  did  seem  to  pro 
ceed,  as  Margaret  had  suggested,  in  a  long 
chain  of  violent  shocks,  narrow  escapes,  and 
closely  averted  catastrophes.  No  sooner 
was  Duncan's  rash  pronounced  not  to  be 
scarlet  fever  than  Robert  swallowed  a  penny, 
or  Beck  set  fire  to  the  dining-room  waste- 
basket,  or  Dad  foresaw  the  immediate  failure 
of  the  Weston  Home  Savings  Bank,  and 
the  inevitable  loss  of  his  position  there. 
Sometimes  there  was  a  paternal  explosion 
because  Bruce  liked  to  murmur  vaguely  of 
"dandy  chances  in  Manila,"  or  because 
Julie,  pretty,  excitable,  and  sixteen,  had  an 
occasional  dose  of  stage  fever,  and  would 
stammer  desperately  between  convulsive 

35 


36  MOTHER 

sobs  that  she  wasn't  half  as  much  afraid  of 
"the  terrible  temptations  of  the  life"  as  she 
was  afraid  of  dying  a  poky  old  maid  in 
Weston.  In  short,  the  home  was  crowded, 
the  Pagets  were  poor,  and  every  one  of  the 
seven  possessed  a  spirited  and  distinct  en 
tity.  All  the  mother's  effort  could  not  keep 
them  always  contented.  Growing  ambi 
tions  made  the  Weston  horizon  seem  nar 
row  and  mean,  and  the  young  eyes  that 
could  not  see  beyond  to-morrow  were  often 
wet  with  rebellious  tears. 

Through  it  all  they  loved  each  other; 
sometimes  whole  weeks  went  by  in  utter 
harmony;  the  children  contented  over 
"Parches"  on  the  hearthrug  in  the  winter 
evenings,  Julie  singing  in  the  morning  sun 
light,  as  she  filled  the  vases  from  the  shabby 
marguerite  bushes  on  the  lawn.  But  there 
were  other  times  when  to  the  dreamy 
studious  Margaret  the  home  circle  seemed 
all  discord,  all  ugly  dinginess  and  thread- 
bareness;  the  struggle  for  ease  and  beauty 


MOTHER  3; 

and  refinement  seemed  hopeless  and  over 
whelming.  In  these  times  she  would  find 
herself  staring  thoughtfully  at  her  mother's 
face,  bent  over  the  mending  basket,  or  her 
eyes  would  leave  the  chessboard  that  held 
her  father's  attention  so  closely,  and  move 
from  his  bald  spot,  with  its  encircling  crown 
of  fluffy  gray,  to  his  rosy  face,  with  its 
kind,  intent  blue  eyes  and  the  little  lines 
about  his  mouth  that  his  moustache  didn't 
hide — with  a  half-formed  question  in  her 
heart.  What  hadn't  they  done,  these  dear 
est  people,  to  be  always  struggling,  always 
tired,  always  "behind  the  game?"  Why 
should  they  be  eternally  harassed  by  plum 
ber's  bills,  and  dentists'  bills,  and  shoes 
that  would  wear  out,  and  school-books  that 
must  be  bought?  Why  weren't  they  hold 
ing  their  place  in  Weston  society,  the  place 
to  which  they  were  entitled  by  right  of  the 
Quincy  grandfather,  and  the  uncles  who 
were  judges? 

And  in  answer  Margaret  came  despond- 


3  8  MOTHER 

ently  to  the  decision,  "  If  you  have  children, 
you  never  have  anything  else ! "  How  could 
Mother  keep  up  with  her  friends,  when  for 
some  fifteen  years  she  had  been  far  too  busy 
to  put  on  a  dainty  gown  in  the  afternoon, 
and  serve  a  hospitable  cup  of  tea  on  the  east 
porch?  Mother  was  buttering  bread  for 
supper,  then;  opening  little  beds  and  laying 
out  little  nightgowns,  starting  Ted  off  for 
the  milk,  washing  small  hands  and  faces, 
soothing  bumps  and  binding  cuts,  admonish 
ing,  praising,  directing.  Mother  was  only 
too  glad  to  sink  wearily  into  her  rocker  after 
dinner,  and,  after  a  few  spirited  visits  to  the 
rampant  nursery  upstairs,  express  the  hope 
that  nobody  would  come  in  to-night.  Grad 
ually  the  friends  dropped  away,  and  the 
social  life  of  Weston  flowed  smoothly  on 
without  the  Pagets. 

But  when  Margaret  began  to  grow  up, 
she  grasped  the  situation  with  all  the  keen 
ness  of  a  restless  and  ambitious  nature. 
Weston,  detested  Weston,  it  must  appar- 


MOTHER  39 

ently  be.  Very  well,  she  would  make  the 
best  of  Weston.  Margaret  called  on  her 
mother's  old  friends;  she  was  tireless  in 
charming  little  attentions.  Her  own  first 
dances  had  not  been  successful;  she  and 
Bruce  were  not  good  dancers,  Margaret  had 
not  been  satisfied  with  her  gowns,  they  both 
felt  out  of  place.  When  Julie's  dancing 
days  came  along,  Margaret  saw  to  it  that 
everything  was  made  much  easier.  She 
planned  social  evenings  at  home,  and  ex 
hausted  herself  preparing  for  them,  that 
Julie  might  know  the  "right  people."  To 
her  mother  all  people  were  alike,  if  they 
were  kind  and  not  vulgar;  Margaret  felt 
very  differently.  It  was  a  matter  of  the 
greatest  satisfaction  to  her  when  Julie  blos 
somed  into  a  fluffy-haired  butterfly,  tre 
mendously  in  demand,  in  spite  of  much- 
cleaned  slippers  and  often-pressed  frocks. 
Margaret  arranged  Christmas  theatricals, 
May  picnics,  Fourth  of  July  gatherings. 
She  never  failed  Bruce  when  this  dearest 


40  MOTHER 

brother  wanted  her  company;  she  was,  as 
Mrs.  Paget  told  her  over  and  over,  "the 
sweetest  daughter  any  woman  ever  had." 
But  deep  in  her  heart  she  knew  moods  of 
bitter  distaste  and  restlessness.  The  strug 
gle  did  not  seem  worth  the  making;  the  odds 
against  her  seemed  too  great. 

Still  dreaming  in  the  winter  dark,  she 
went  through  the  home  gate,  and  up  the 
porch  steps  of  a  roomy,  cheap  house  that 
had  been  built  in  the  era  of  scalloped  and 
pointed  shingles,  of  colored  glass  embellish 
ments  around  the  window-panes,  of  perfo 
rated  scroll  work  and  wooden  railings  in 
Grecian  designs.  A  mass  of  wet  over 
shoes  lay  on  the  porch,  and  two  or  three  of 
the  weather-stained  porch  rockers  swayed 
under  the  weight  of  spread  wet  raincoats. 
Two  opened  umbrellas  wheeled  in  the  cur 
rent  of  air  that  came  around  the  house;  the 
porch  ran  water.  While  Margaret  was 
adding  her  own  rainy-day  equipment  to  the 


MOTHER  41 

others,  a  golden-brown  setter,  one  ecstatic 
wriggle  from  nose  to  tail,  flashed  into  view, 
and  came  fawning  to  her  feet. 

"Hello,  Bran!"  Margaret  said,  propping 
herself  against  the  house  with  one  hand, 
while  she  pulled  at  a  tight  overshoe.  "  Hello, 
old  fellow !  Well,  did  they  lock  him  out  ? " 

She  let  herself  and  a  freezing  gust  of  air 
into  the  dark  hall,  groping  to  the  hat-rack 
for  matches.  While  she  was  lighting  the 
gas,  a  very  pretty  girl  of  sixteen,  with  crim 
son  cheeks  and  tumbled  soft  dark  hair, 
came  to  the  dining-room  door.  This  was 
her  sister  Julie,  Margaret's  roommate  and 
warmest  admirer,  and  for  the  last  year  or 
two  her  inseparable  companion.  Julie  had 
her  finger  in  a  book,  but  now  she  closed  it, 
and  said  affectionately  between  her  yawns: 
"Come  in  here,  darling!  You  must  be 
dead." 

"  Don't  let  Bran  in,"  cried  some  one  from 
upstairs. 

"He   is   in,    Mother!"    Margaret    called 


42  MOTHER 

back,  and  Rebecca  and  the  three  small 
boys — Theodore,  the  four-year-old  baby, 
Robert,  and  Duncan,  a  grave  little  lad  of 
seven — all  rushed  out  of  the  dining-room 
together,  shouting,  as  they  fell  on  the  de 
lighted  dog: 

"Aw,  leave  him  in!  Aw,  leave  the  poor 
little  feller  in!  Come  on,  Bran,  come  on, 
old  feller!  Leave  him  in,  Mark,  can't  we?" 

Kissing  and  hugging  the  dog,  and  stum 
bling  over  each  other  and  over  him,  they 
went  back  to  the  dining-room,  which  was 
warm  and  stuffy.  A  coal  fire  was  burning 
low  in  the  grate,  the  window-panes  were 
beaded,  and  the  little  boys  had  marked  their 
initials  in  the  steam.  They  had  also  pushed 
the  fringed  table-cover  almost  off,  and  scat 
tered  the  contents  of  a  box  of  "Lotto"  over 
the  scarred  walnut  top.  The  room  was 
shabby,  ugly,  comfortable.  Julie  and  Mar 
garet  had  established  a  tea-table  in  the  bay 
window,  had  embroidered  a  cover  for  the 
wide  couch,  had  burned  the  big  wooden 


MOTHER  43 

bowl  that  was  supposedly  always  full  of 
nuts  or  grapes  or  red  apples.  But  these 
touches  were  lost  in  the  mass  of  less  pleasing 
detail.  The  "body  Brussels"  carpet  was 
worn,  the  wall  paper  depressing,  the  wood 
work  was  painted  dark  brown,  with  an 
imitation  burl  smeared  in  by  the  painter's 
thumb.  The  chairs  were  of  several  differ 
ent  woods  and  patterns,  the  old  black  wal 
nut  sideboard  clumsy  and  battered.  About 
the  fire  stood  some  comfortable  worn  chairs. 
Margaret  dropped  wearily  into  one  of  these, 
and  the  dark-eyed  Julie  hung  over  her  with 
little  affectionate  attentions.  The  children 
returned  to  their  game. 

"Well,  what  a  time  you  had  with  little 
Dolly  Scott!"  said  Julie,  sympathetically. 
"Ted's  been  getting  it  all  mixed  up!  Tell 
us  about  it.  Poor  old  Mark,  you're  all  in, 
aren't  you?  Mark,  would  you  like  a  cup 
of  tea?" 

"Love  it!"  Margaret  said,  a  little  sur 
prised,  for  this  luxury  was  not  common. 


44  MOTHER 

"And  toast — we'll  toast  it!"  said  Theo 
dore,  enthusiastically. 

"No,  no — no  tea!"  said  Mrs.  Paget, 
coming  in  at  this  point  with  some  sewing  in 
her  hands.  "  Don't  spoil  your  dinner,  now, 
Mark  dear;  tea  doesn't  do  you  any  good. 
And  I  think  Blanche  is  saving  the  cream  for 
an  apple  tapioca.  Theodore,  Mother  wants 
you  to  go  right  downstairs  for  some  coal, 
dear.  And,  Julie,  you'd  better  start  your 
table;  it's  close  to  six.  Put  up  the  game, 
Rebecca!" 

There  was  general  protest.  Duncan,  it 
seemed,  needed  only  "two  more"  to  win. 
Little  Robert,  who  was  benevolently  al 
lowed  by  the  other  children  to  play  the 
game  exactly  as  he  pleased,  screamed  de 
lightedly  that  he  needed  only  one  more,  and 
showed  a  card  upon  which  even  the  blank 
spaces  were  lavishly  covered  with  glass. 
He  was  generously  conceded  the  victory, 
and  kissed  by  Rebecca  and  Julie  as  he  made 
his  way  to  his  mother's  lap. 


MOTHER  45 

"Why,  this  can't  be  Robert  Paget!"  said 
Mrs.  Paget,  putting  aside  her  sewing  to 
gather  him  in  her  arms.  "Not  this  great, 
big  boy!" 

"Yes,  I  am!"  the  little  fellow  asserted 
joyously,  dodging  her  kisses. 

"Good  to  get  home!"  Margaret  said  luxu 
riously. 

"  You  must  sleep  late  in  the  morning,"  her 
mother  commanded  affectionately. 

"Yes,  because  you  have  to  be  fresh  for 
the  party  Monday!"  exulted  Julie.  She 
had  flung  a  white  cloth  over  the  long  table, 
and  was  putting  the  ringed  napkins  down 
with  rapid  bangs.  "And  New  Year's  Eve's 
the  dance!"  she  went  on  buoyantly.  "I 
just  love  Christmas,  anyway!" 

"Rebecca,  ask  Blanche  if  she  needs  me," 
that  was  Mother. 

"  You'd  go  perfectly  crazy  about  her,  Ju, 
she's  the  most  fascinating,  and  the  most 
unaffected  woman!"  Margaret  was  full  of 
the  day's  real  event. 


46  MOTHER 

"And  Mother  theth  that  Ted  and  Dune 
and  I  can  have  our  friendth  in  on  the  day 
after  Chrithmath  to  thee  the  Chrithmath 
tree!"  That  was  Rebecca,  who  added, 
"Blanche  theth  no,  Mother,  unleth  you 
want  to  make  thorn  cream  gravy  for  the 
chopth!" 

"And,  Mark,  Eleanor  asked  if  Bruce 
and  you  and  I  weren't  going  as  Pierrot  and 
Pierettes;  she's  simply  crazy  to  find  out!" 
This  was  Julie  again;  and  then  Margaret, 
coaxingly,  "Do  make  cream  gravy  for 
Bruce,  Mother.  Give  Baby  to  me!"  and 
little  Robert's  elated  "I  know  three  things 
Becky's  going  to  get  for  Christmas,  Mark!" 

"Well,  I  think  I  will,  there's  milk,"  Mrs. 
Paget  conceded,  rising.  "Put  Bran  out, 
Teddy;  or  put  him  in  the  laundry  if  you 
want  to,  while  we  have  dinner."  Mar 
garet  presently  followed  her  mother  into 
the  kitchen,  stopping  in  a  crowded  pas 
sageway  to  tie  an  apron  over  her  school 
gown. 


MOTHER  47 

"Bruce  come  in  yet?"  she  said  in  a  low 
voice. 

Her  mother  flashed  her  a  sympathetic  look. 

"I  don't  believe  he's  coming,  Mark." 

"  Isn't  I  Oh,  Mother !  Oh,  Mother,  does 
he  feel  so  badly  about  Betty?" 

"I  suppose  so!"  Mrs.  Paget  went  on 
with  her  bread  cutting. 

"  But,  Mother,  surely  he  didn't  expect  to 
marry  Betty  Forsythe?" 

"I  don't  know  why  not,  Mark.  She's  a 
sweet  little  thing." 

"But,  Mother "  Margaret  was  a 

little  at  a  loss.  "We  don't  seem  old  enough 
to  really  be  getting  married!"  she  said,  a 
little  lamely. 

"  Brucie  came  in  about  half-past  five,  and 
said  he  was  going  over  to  Richie's,"  Mrs. 
Paget  said,  with  a  sigh. 

"In  all  this  rain — that  long  walk!"  Mar 
garet  ejaculated,  as  she  filled  a  long  wicker 
basket  with  sliced  bread. 

"I  think  an  evening  of  work  with  Richie 


48  MOTHER 

will  do  him  a  world  of  good,"  said  his 
mother.  There  was  a  pause.  "There's 
Dad.  I'll  go  in,"  she  said,  suddenly  ending 
it,  as  the  front  door  slammed. 

Margaret  went  in,  too,  to  kiss  her  father, 
a  tired-looking,  gray-haired  man  close  to 
fifty,  who  had  taken  her  chair  by  the  fire. 
Mrs.  Paget  was  anxious  to  be  assured  that 
his  shoulders  and  shoes  were  not  damp. 

"But  your  hands  are  icy,  Daddy,"  said 
she,  as  she  sat  down  behind  a  smoking  tureen 
at  the  head  of  the  table.  "Come,  have 
your  nice  hot  soup,  dear.  Pass  that  to 
Dad,  Becky,  and  light  the  other  gas.  What 
sort  of  a  day?" 

"A  hard  day,"  said  Mr.  Paget,  heavily. 
"Here,  one  of  you  girls  put  Baby  into  his 
chair.  Let  go,  Bob — I'm  too  tired  to-night 
for  monkey-shines!"  He  sat  down  stiffly. 
"Where's  Bruce?  Can't  that  boy  remem 
ber  what  time  we  have  dinner?" 

"Bruce  is  going  to  have  supper  with 
Richie  Williams,  Dad,"  said  Mrs.  Paget, 


MOTHER  49 

serenely.  "They'll  get  out  their  blue  prints 
afterward  and  have  a  good  evening's  work. 
Fill  the  glasses  before  you  sit  down,  Ju. 
Come,  Ted — put  that  back  on  the  mantel. 
Come,  Becky!  Tell  Daddy  about  what 

happened  to-day,  Mark 

They  all  drew  up  their  chairs.  Robert, 
recently  graduated  from  a  high  chair,  was 
propped  upon  "The  Officers  of  the  Civil 
War"  and  "The  Household  Book  of  Verse." 
Julie  tied  on  his  bib,  and  kissed  the  back  of 
his  fat  little  neck  before  she  slipped  into  her 
own  seat.  The  mother  sat  between  Ted 
and  Duncan,  for  reasons  that  immediately 
became  obvious.  Margaret  sat  by  her 
father,  and  attended  to  his  needs,  telling 
him  all  about  the  day,  and  laying  her  pretty 
slim  hand  over  his  as  it  rested  beside  his 
plate.  The  chops  and  cream  gravy,  as 
well  as  a  mountain  of  baked  potatoes,  and 
various  vegetables,  were  under  discussion, 
when  every  one  stopped  short  in  surprise 
at  hearing  the  doorbell  ring. 


So  MOTHER 

"Who ?"  said  Margaret,  turning  puz 
zled  brows  to  her  mother,  and  "I'm  sure 
I—  '  her  mother  answered,  shaking  her 
head.  Ted  was  heard  to  mutter  uneasily 
that,  gee,  maybe  it  was  old  Pembroke,  mad 
because  the  fellers  had  soaked  his  old 
skate  with  snowballs;  Julie  dimpled  and 
said,  "  Maybe  it's  flowers ! "  Robert  shouted 
"Bakeryman!"  more  because  he  had  re 
cently  acquired  the  word  than  because  of 
any  conviction  on  the  subject.  In  the  end 
Julie  went  to  the  door,  with  the  four  chil 
dren  in  her  wake.  When  she  came  back, 
she  looked  bewildered,  and  the  children  a 
little  alarmed. 

"It's— it's  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt,  Mother," 
said  Julie. 

"Well,  don't  leave  her  standing  there  in 
the  cold,  dear!"  Mrs.  Paget  said,  rising 
quickly,  to  go  into  the  hall.  Margaret,  her 
heart  thumping  with  an  unanalyzed  prem 
onition  of  something  pleasant,  and  ner 
vous,  too,  for  the  hospitality  of  the  Pagets, 


MOTHER  51 

followed  her.  So  they  were  all  presently 
crowded  into  the  hall,  Mrs.  Paget  all  hos 
pitality,  Margaret  full  of  a  fear  she  would 
have  denied  that  her  mother  would  not  be 
equal  to  the  occasion,  the  children  curious, 
Julie  a  little  embarrassed. 

The  visitor,  fur-clad,  rain-spattered — for 
it  was  raining  again — and  beaming,  stretched 
a  hand  to  Mrs.  Paget. 

"You're  Mrs.  Paget,  of  course — this  is  an 
awful  hour  to  interrupt  you,"  she  said  in 
her  big,  easy  way,  "and  there's  my  Miss 
Paget — how  do  you  do?  But  you  see  I 
must  get  up  to  town  to-night — in  this  door? 
I  can  see  perfectly,  thank  you — and  I  did 
want  a  little  talk  with  you  first.  Now, 
what  a  shame!" — for  the  gas,  lighted  by 
Theodore  at  this  point,  revealed  Duncan's 
bib,  and  the  napkins  some  of  the  others 
were  still  carrying.  "I've  interrupted  your 
dinner!  Won't  you  let  me  wait  here  un 
til " 

"Perhaps — if  you  haven't  had  your  sup- 


52  MOTHER 

per — you  will  have  some  with  us,"  said  Mrs. 
Paget,  a  little  uncertainly.  Margaret  in 
wardly  shuddered,  but  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  was 
gracious. 

"Mrs.  Paget,  that's  charming  of  you," 
she  said.  "But  I  had  tea  at  Dayton,  and 
mustn't  lose  another  moment.  I  shan't 
dine  until  I  get  home.  I'm  the  busiest 
woman  in  the  world,  you  know.  Now,  it 
won't  take  me  two  minutes " 

She  was  seated  now,  her  hands  still  deep 
in  her  muff,  for  the  parlor  was  freezing  cold. 
Mrs.  Paget,  with  a  rather  bewildered  look, 
sat  down,  too. 

"  You  can  run  back  to  your  dinners,"  said 
she  to  the  children.  "Take  them,  Julie. 
Mark,  dear,  will  you  help  the  pudding?" 
They  all  filed  dutifully  out  of  the  room,  and 
Margaret,  excited  and  curious,  continued 
a  meal  that  might  have  been  of  sawdust  and 
sand  for  all  she  knew.  The  strain  did  not 
last  long;  in  about  ten  minutes  Mrs.  Paget 
looked  into  the  room,  with  a  rather  worried 


MOTHER  53 

expression,  and  said,  a  little  breathlessly: 
" Daddy,  can  you  come  here  a  moment? — 
You're  all  right,  dear,"  she  added,  as  Mr. 
Paget  indicated  with  an  embarrassed  ges 
ture  his  well-worn  house-coat.  They  went 
out  together.  The  young  people  sat  almost 
without  speaking,  listening  to  the  indis 
tinguishable  murmur  from  the  adjoining 
room,  and  smiling  mysteriously  at  each 
other.  Then  Margaret  was  called,  and 
went  as  far  as  the  dining-room  door,  and 
came  back  to  put  her  napkin  uncertainly 
down  at  her  place,  hesitated,  arranged  her 
gown  carefully,  and  finally  went  out  again. 
They  heard  her  voice  with  the  others  in  the 
parlor  .  .  .  questioning  .  .  .  laugh 
ing  .  . 

Presently  the  low  murmur  broke  into 
audible  farewells;  chairs  were  pushed  back, 
feet  scraped  in  the  hall. 

"Good-night,    then!"    said    Mrs.    Carr- 
Boldt's  clear  tones, "  and  so  sorry  to  have — 
Good-night,  Mr.  Paget ! — Oh,  thank  you — but 


54  MOTHER 

I'm  well  wrapped.  Thank  you!  Good-night, 
dear!  I'll  see  you  again  soon — I'll  write." 

And  then  came  the  honking  of  the  motor 
car,  and  a  great  swish  where  it  grazed  a  wet 
bush  near  the  house.  Somebody  lowered 
the  gas  in  the  hall,  and  Mrs.  Paget's  voice 
said  regretfully,  "I  wish  we  had  had  a  fire 
in  the  parlor — just  one  of  the  times! — but 
there's  no  help  for  it."  They  all  came  in, 
Margaret  flushed,  starry-eyed;  her  father 
and  mother  a  little  serious.  The  three 
blinked  at  the  brighter  light,  and  fell  upon 
the  cooling  chops  as  if  eating  were  the  im 
portant  business  of  the  moment. 

"We  waited  the  pudding,"  said  Julie. 
"Whatsit?" 

"Why-  -"  Mrs.  Paget  began,  hesitat 
ingly.  Mr.  Paget  briskly  took  the  matter 
out  of  her  hands. 

"This  lady,"  he  said,  with  an  air  of  mak 
ing  any  further  talk  unnecessary,  "needs  a 
secretary,  and  she  has  offered  your  sister 
Margaret  the  position.  That's  the  whole 


MOTHER  55 

affair  in  a  nutshell.  I'm  not  at  all  sure 
that  your  mother  and  I  think  it  a  wise  offer 
for  Margaret  to  accept,  and  I  want  to  say 
here  and  now  that  I  don't  want  any  child 
of  mine  to  speak  of  this  matter,  or  make  it  a 
matter  of  general  gossip  in  the  neighbor 
hood.  Mother,  I'd  like  very  much  to  have 
Blanche  make  me  a  fresh  cup  of  tea." 

"Wants  Margaret!"  gasped  Julie,  un 
affected — so  astonishing  was  the  news — by 
her  father's  unusual  sternness.  "  Oh,  Mother ! 
Oh,  Mark!  Oh,  you  lucky  thing!  When  is 
she  coming  down  here?" 

"  She  isn't  coming  down  here — she  wants 
Mark  to  go  to  her — that's  it,"  said  her 
mother. 

"Mark— in  New  York!"  shrilled  Theo 
dore.  Julie  got  up  to  rush  around  the  table 
and  kiss  her  sister;  the  younger  children 
laughed  and  shouted. 

"There  is  no  occasion  for  all  this,"  said 
Mr.  Paget,  but  mildly,  for  the  fresh  tea  had 
arrived.  "  Just  quiet  them  down,  will  you, 


56  MOTHER 

Mother?  I  see  nothing  very  extraordinary 
in  the  matter.  This  Mrs. — Mrs.  Carr- 
Boldt — is  it? — needs  a  secretary  and  com 
panion;  and  she  offers  the  position  to  Mark/' 

"But — but  she  never  even  saw  Mark 
until  to-day!"  marvelled  Julie. 

"I  hardly  see  how  that  affects  it,  my 
dear!"  her  father  observed  unenthusias 
tically. 

"Why,  I  think  it  makes  it  simply  extraor 
dinary!"  exulted  the  generous  little  sister. 
"Oh,  Mark,  isn't  this  just  the  sort  of  thing 
you  would  have  wished  to  happen!  Secre 
tary  work — just  what  you  love  to  do!  And 
you,  with  your  beautiful  handwriting,  you'll 
just  be  invaluable  to  her !  And  your  German 
— and  I'll  bet  you'll  just  have  them  all 
adoring  you !" 

"Oh,  Ju,  if  I  only  can  do  it!"  burst  from 
Margaret,  with  a  little  childish  gasp.  She 
was  sitting  back  from  the  table,  twisted 
about  so  that  she  sat  sideways,  her  hands 
clasped  about  the  top  bar  of  her  chair-back. 


MOTHER  57 

Her  tawny  soft  hair  was  loosened  about 
her  face,  her  dark  eyes  aflame.  "Lenox, 
she  said/'  Margaret  went  on  dazedly;  "and 
Europe,  and  travelling  everywhere!  And 
a  hundred  dollars  a  month,  and  nothing  to 
spend  it  on,  so  I  can  still  help  out  here !  Why, 
it — I  can't  believe  it!" — she  looked  from 
one  smiling  interested  face  to  another,  and 
suddenly  her  radiance  underwent  a  quick 
eclipse.  Her  lip  trembled,  and  she  tried  to 
laugh  as  she  pushed  her  chair  back,  and  ran 
to  the  arms  her  mother  opened.  "Oh, 
Mother!"  sobbed  Margaret,  clinging  there, 
"do  you  want  me  to  go — shall  I  go?  I've 
always  been  so  happy  here,  and  I  feel  so 
ashamed  of  being  discontented — and  I  don't 
deserve  a  thing  like  this  to  happen  to  me!'* 

"Why,  God  bless  her  heart!"  said  Mrs. 
Paget,  tenderly;  "of  course  you'll  go!" 

"Oh,  you  silly!  I'll  never  speak  to  you 
again  if  you  don't!"  laughed  Julie,  through 
sympathetic  tears. 

Theodore  and  Duncan  immediately  burst 


58  MOTHER 

into  a  radiant  reminiscence  of  their  one 
brief  visit  to  New  York;  Rebecca  was  heard 
to  murmur  that  she  would  "vithet  Mark 
thome  day";  and  the  baby,  tugging  at  his 
mother's  elbow,  asked  sympathetically  if 
Mark  was  naughty,  and  was  caught  be 
tween  his  sister's  and  his  mother's  arms  and 
kissed  by  them  both.  Mr.  Paget,  picking 
his  paper  from  the  floor  beside  his  chair, 
took  an  armchair  by  the  fire,  stirred  the 
coals  noisily,  and  while  cleaning  his  glasses, 
observed  rather  huskily  that  the  little  girl 
always  knew  she  could  come  back  again  if 
anything  went  wrong. 

"But  suppose  /  don't  suit?"  suggested 
Margaret,  sitting  back  on  her  heels,  re 
freshed  by  tears,  and  with  her  arms  laid 
across  her  mother's  lap. 

"Oh,  you'll  suit"  said  Julie,  confidently; 
and  Mrs.  Paget  smoothed  the  girl's  hair 
back  and  said  affectionately,  "  I  don't  think 
she'll  find  many  girls  like  you  for  the  asking, 
Mark!" 


MOTHER  59 

"  Reading  English  with  the  two  little  girls," 
said  Margaret,  dreamily,  "and  answering  notes 
and  invitations.  And  keeping  books 

"You  can  do  that  anyway,"  said  her 
father,  over  his  paper. 

"And  dinner  lists,  you  know,  Mother— 
doesn't  it   sound  like  an   English  story!" 
Margaret  stopped  in  the  middle  of  an  ecsta 
tic    wriggle.     "Mother,    will    you    pray    I 
succeed?"  she  said  solemnly. 

"Just  be  your  own  dear  simple  self, 
Mark,"  her  mother  advised.  "January!" 
she  added,  with  a  great  sigh.  "It's  the 
first  break,  isn't  it,  Dad  ?  Think  of  trying 
to  get  along  without  our  Mark!" 

"January!"  Julie  was  instantly  alert, 
"Why,  but  you'll  need  all  sorts  of  clothes!" 

"Oh,  she  says  there's  a  sewing  woman 
always  in  the  house,"  Margaret  said,  almost 
embarrassed  by  the  still-unfolding  advan 
tages  of  the  proposition.  "  I  can  have  her  do 
whatever's  left  over."  Her  father  lowered 
his  paper  to  give  her  a  shrewd  glance. 


60  MOTHER 

"I  suppose  somebody  knows  something 
about  this  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt,  Mother?" 
asked  he.  "She's  all  right,  I  suppose?" 

"Oh,  Dad,  her  name's  always  in  the 
papers,"  Julie  burst  out;  and  the  mother 
smiled  as  she  said,  "We'll  be  pretty  sure  of 
everything  before  we  let  our  Mark  go!" 
Later,  when  the  children  had  been  dismissed 
and  he  himself  was  going,  rather  stiffly, 
toward  the  stairs,  Mr.  Paget  again  voiced 
a  mild  doubt. 

"There  was  a  perfectly  good  reason  for 
her  hurry,  I  suppose?  Old  secretary  de 
serted — got  married ?  She  had  good 

reason  for  wanting  Mark  in  all  this 
hurry?" 

Mrs.  Paget  and  her  daughters  had  settled 
about  the  fire  for  an  hour's  delicious  dis 
cussion,  but  she  interrupted  it  to  say  sooth 
ingly,  "It  was  her  cousin,  Dad,  who's  going 
to  be  married,  and  she's  been  trying  to  get 
hold  of  just  the  right  person — she  says  she's 
fearfully  behindhand " 


MOTHER  6r 

"Well,  you  know  best/'  said  Mr.  Paget, 
departing  a  little  discontentedly. 

Left  to  the  dying  fire,  the  others  talked, 
yawned,  made  a  pretence  of  breaking  up, 
talked  and  yawned  again.  The  room  grew 
chilly.  Bruce — oldest  of  the  children — 
dark,  undemonstrative,  weary — presently 
came  in,  and  was  given  the  news,  and  mar 
velled  in  his  turn.  Bruce  and  Margaret 
had  talked  of  their  ambitions  a  hundred 
times:  of  the  day  when  he  might  enter 
college  and  when  she  might  find  the  leisure 
and  beauty  in  life  for  which  her  soul  hun 
gered.  Now,  as  he  sat  with  his  arm  about 
her,  and  her  head  on  his  shoulder,  he  said 
with  generous  satisfaction  over  and  over: 

"It  was  coming  to  you,  Mark;  you've 
earned  it!" 

At  midnight,  loitering  upstairs,  cold  and 
yawning,  Margaret  kissed  her  mother  and 
brother  quietly,  with  whispered  brief  good- 
nights.  But  Julie,  lying  warm  and  snug  in 
bed  half  an  hour  later,  had  a  last  word: 


62  MOTHER 

"You  know,  Mark,  I  think  I'm  as  happy 
as  you  are — no,  I'm  not  generous  at  all!  It's 
just  that  it  makes  me  feel  that  things  do 
come  your  way  finally,  if  you  wait  long 
enough,  and  that  we  aren't  the  only  family 
in  town  that  never  has  anything  decent 
happen  to  it!  .  .  .  Til  miss  you  awfully, 
Mark,  darling!  .  .  .  Mark,  do  you  sup 
pose  Mother'd  let  me  take  this  bed  out,  and 
just  have  a  big  couch  in  here?  It  would 
make  the  room  seem  so  much  bigger.  And 
then  I  could  have  the  girls  come  up  here, 
don't  you  know — when  they  came  over. 
.  .  .  Think  of  you — you — going  abroad ! 
I'd  simply  die!  I  can't  wait  to  tell  Betty! 
.  .  .  I  hope  to  goodness  Mother  won't 
put  Beck  in  here!  .  .  .  We've  had  this 
room  a  long  time  together,  haven't  we? 
Ever  since  Grandma  died.  Do  you  remem 
ber  her  canary,  that  Teddy  hit  with  a 
plate?  .  .  .  I'm  going  to  miss  you 
terribly,  Mark.  But  we'll  write.  .  .  ." 


CHAPTER  III 

IN  THE  days  that  followed,  the  mira 
cle  came  to  be  accepted  by  all  Wes- 
ton,  which  was  much  excited  for  a 
day  or  two  over  this  honor  done  a  favorite 
daughter,  and  by  all  the  Pagets — except 
Margaret.  Margaret  went  through  the 
hours  in  her  old,  quiet  manner,  a  little  more 
tender  and  gentle  perhaps  than  she  had 
been;  but  her  heart  never  beat  normally, 
and  she  lay  awake  late  at  night,  and  early 
in  the  morning,  thinking,  thinking,  think 
ing.  She  tried  to  realize  that  it  was  in  her 
honor  that  a  farewell  tea  was  planned  at 
the  club,  it  was  for  her  that  her  fellow- 
teachers  were  planning  a  good-bye  luncheon ; 
it  was  really  she — Margaret  Pagct — whose 
voice  said  at  the  telephone  a  dozen  times  a 
day,  "On  the  fourteenth. — Oh,  do  I?  I 

63 


64  MOTHER 

don't  feel  calm!  Can't  you  try  to  come  in 
— I  do  want  to  see  you  before  I  go!"  She 
dutifully  repeated  Bruce's  careful  direc 
tions;  she  was  to  give  her  check  to  an  ex 
pressman,  and  her  suitcase  to  a  red-cap ;  the 
expressman  would  probably  charge  fifty 
cents,  the  red-cap  was  to  have  no  more  than 
fifteen.  And  she  was  to  tell  the  latter  to 
put  her  into  a  taxicab. 

"I'll  remember/'  Margaret  assured  him 
gratefully,  but  with  a  sense  of  unreality 
pressing  almost  painfully  upon  her.  One 
of  a  million  ordinary  school  teachers,  in  a 
million  little  towns — and  this  marvel  had 
befallen  her! 

The  night  of  the  Pagets'  Christmas  play 
came,  a  night  full  of  laughter  and  triumph; 
and  marked  for  Margaret  by  the  little  part 
ing  gifts  that  were  slipped  into  her  hands, 
and  by  the  warm  good  wishes  that  were 
murmured,  not  always  steadily,  by  this  old 
friend  and  that.  When  the  time  came  to 
distribute  plates  and  paper  napkins,  and 


MOTHER  65 

great  saucers  of  ice  cream  and  sliced  cake, 
Margaret  was  toasted  in  cold  sweet  lemon 
ade;  and  drawing  close  together  to  "har 
monize"  more  perfectly,  the  circle  about 
her  touched  their  glasses  while  they  sang, 
"For  she's  a  jolly  good  fellow/'  Later, 
when  the  little  supper  was  almost  over, 
Ethel  Elliot,  leaning  over  to  lay  her  hand  on 
Margaret's,  began  in  her  rich  contralto: 

"When  other  Hps  and  other  hearts     .     .     ." 

and  as  they  all  went  seriously  through  the 
two  verses,  they  stood  up,  one  by  one,  and 
linked  arms;  the  little  circle,  affectionate 
and  admiring,  that  had  bounded  Margaret's 
friendships  until  now. 

Then  Christmas  came,  with  a  dark, 
freezing  walk  to  the  pine-spiced  and  candle- 
lighted  early  service  in  the  little  church,  and 
a  quicker  walk  home,  chilled  and  happy  and 
hungry,  to  a  riotous  Christmas  breakfast 
and  a  littered  breakfast  table.  The  new 
year  came,  with  a  dance  and  revel,  and  the 


66  MOTHER 

Pagets  took  one  of  their  long  tramps  through 
the  snowy  afternoon,  and  came  back  hungry 
for  a  big  dinner.  Then  there  was  dress 
making — Mrs.  Schmidt  in  command,  Mrs. 
Paget  tireless  at  the  machine,  Julie  all  eager 
interest.  Margaret,  patiently  standing  to 
be  fitted,  conscious  of  the  icy,  wet  touch  of 
Mrs.  Schmidt's  red  fingers  on  her  bare  arms, 
dreamily  acquiescent  as  to  buttons  or  hooks, 
was  totally  absent  in  spirit. 

A  trunk  came,  Mr.  Paget  very  anxious 
that  the  keys  should  not  be  "fooled  with" 
by  the  children.  Margaret's  mother  packed 
this  trunk  scientifically.  "No,  now  the 
shoes,  Mark — now  that  heavy  skirt,"  she 
would  say.  "Run  get  mother  some  more 
tissue  paper,  Beck.  You'll  have  to  leave 
the  big  cape,  dear,  and  you  can  send  for  it 
if  you  need  it.  Now  the  blue  dress,  Ju.  I 
think  that  dyed  so  prettily,  just  the  thing 
for  mornings.  And  here's  your  prayer 
book  in  the  tray,  dear;  if  you  go  Saturday 
you'll  want  it  the  first  thing  in  the  morn- 


MOTHER  67 

ing.     See,  I'll  put  a  fresh  handkerchief  in 


it- 


Margaret,  relaxed  and  idle,  in  a  rocker, 
with  Duncan  in  her  lap  busily  working  at 
her  locket,  would  say  over  and  over: 

"You're  all  such  angels — I'll  never  for 
get  it!"  and  wish  that,  knowing  how  sin 
cerely  she  meant  it,  she  could  feel  it  a  little 
more.  Conversation  languished  in  these 
days;  mother  and  daughters  feeling  that 
time  was  too  precious  to  waste  speech  of 
little  things,  and  that  their  hearts  were  too  full 
to  touch  upon  the  great  change  impending. 

A  night  came  when  the  Pagets  went  early 
upstairs,  saying  that,  after  all,  it  was  not 
like  people  marrying  and  going  to  Russia;  it 
was  not  like  a  real  parting;  it  wasn't  as  if 
Mark  couldn't  come  home  again  in  four 
hours  if  anything  went  wrong  at  either  end 
of  the  line.  Margaret's  heart  was  beating 
high  and  quick  now;  she  tried  to  show  some 
of  the  love  and  sorrow  she  knew  she  should 
have  felt,  she  knew  that  she  did  feel  under 


68  MOTHER 

the  hurry  of  her  blood  that  made  speech 
impossible.  She  went  to  her  mother's  door, 
slender  and  girlish  in  her  white  nightgown, 
to  kiss  her  good-night  again.  Mrs.  Paget's 
big  arms  went  about  her  daughter.  Mar 
garet  laid  her  head  childishly  on  her  mother's 
shoulder.  Nothing  of  significance  was  said. 
Margaret  whispered,  "Mother,  I  love  you!" 
Her  mother  said,  "You  were  such  a  little 
thing,  Mark,  when  I  kissed  you  one  day, 
without  hugging  you,  and  you  said,  '  Please 
don't  love  me  just  with  your  face,  Mother, 
love  me  with  your  heart !' '  Then  she  added, 
"Did  you  and  Julie  get  that  extra  blanket 
down  to-day,  dear? — it's  going  to  be  very 
cold."  Margaret  nodded.  "Good-night, 

little  girl "  "Good-night,  Mother " 

That  was  the  real  farewell,  for  the  next 
morning  was  all  confusion.  They  dressed 
hurriedly,  by  chilly  gas-light;  clocks  were 
compared,  Rebecca's  back  buttoned;  Dun 
can's  overcoat  jerked  on;  coffee  drunk 
scalding  hot  as  they  stood  about  the  kitchen 


MOTHER  69 

table;  bread  barely  tasted.  They  walked 
to  the  railway  station  on  wet  sidewalks, 
under  a  broken  sky,  Bruce,  with  Margaret's 
suitcase,  in  the  lead.  Weston  was  asleep 
in  the  gray  morning,  after  the  storm.  Far 
and  near  belated  cocks  were  crowing. 

A  score  of  old  friends  met  Margaret  at  the 
train;  there  were  gifts,  promises,  good  wishes. 
There  came  a  moment  when  it  was  generally 
felt  that  the  Pagets  should  be  left  alone, 
now — the  far  whistle  of  the  train  beyond 
the  bridge — the  beginning  of  good-byes — a 
sudden  filling  of  the  mother's  eyes  that  was 
belied  by  her  smile. — "Good-bye,  sweetest 
— don't  knock  my  hat  off,  baby  dear!  Beck, 
darling — Oh,  Ju,  do  !  don't  just  say  it — start 
me  a  letter  to-night!  ALL  write  to  me! 
Good-bye,  Dad,  darling — all  right,  Bruce, 
I'll  get  right  in! — good-bye!  Good-bye!" 

Then  for  the  Pagets  there  was  a  walk  back 
to  the  empty  disorder  of  the  house:  Julie 
very  talkative,  at  her  father's  side;  Bruce 
walking  far  behind  the  others  with  his 


70  MOTHER 

mother — and  the  day's  familiar  routine  to 
be  somehow  gone  through  without  Mar 
garet. 

But  for  Margaret,  settling  herself  com 
fortably  in  the  grateful  warmth  of  the  train, 
and  watching  the  uncertain  early  sunshine 
brighten  unfamiliar  fields  and  farmhouses, 
every  brilliant  possibility  in  life  seemed  to 
be  waiting.  She  tried  to  read,  to  think,  to 
pray,  to  stare  steadily  out  of  the  window; 
she  could  do  nothing  for  more  than  a  mo 
ment  at  a  time.  Her  thoughts  went  back 
ward  and  forward  like  a  weaving  shuttle: 
"How  good  they've  all  been  to  me!  How 
grateful  I  am!  Now  if  only,  only,  I  can 
make  good!" 

"  Look  out  for  the  servants ! "  Julie,  from 
the  depth  of  her  sixteen-years-old  wisdom 
had  warned  her  sister.  "The  governess 
will  hate  you  because  she'll  be  afraid  you'll 
cut  her  out,  and  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt's  maid 
will  be  a  cat!  They  always  are,  in  books." 

Margaret  had  laughed  at  this  advice,  but 


MOTHER  71 

in  her  heart  she  rather  believed  it.  Her  new 
work  seemed  so  enchanting  to  her  that  it 
was  not  easy  to  believe  that  she  did  not 
stand  in  somebody's  light.  She  was  glad 
that  by  a  last-moment  arrangement  she  was 
to  arrive  at  the  Grand  Central  Station  at 
almost  the  same  moment  as  Mrs.  Carr- 
Boldt  herself,  who  was  coming  home  from  a 
three-weeks'  visit  in  the  Middle  West.  Mar 
garet  gave  only  half  her  attention  to  the 
flying  country  that  was  beginning  to  shape 
itself  into  streets  and  rows  of  houses;  all  the 
last  half-hour  of  the  trip  was  clouded  by  the 
nervous  fear  that  she  would  somehow  fail  to 
find  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  in  the  confusion  at  the 
railroad  terminal. 

But  happily  enough  the  lady  was  found 
without  trouble,  or  rather  Margaret  was 
found,  felt  an  authoritative  tap  on  her 
shoulder,  caught  a  breath  of  fresh  violets 
and  a  glimpse  of  her  patron's  clear-skinned, 
resolute  face.  They  whirled  through  wet, 
deserted  streets;  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  gracious 


72  MOTHER 

and   talkative,   Margaret   nervously  inter 
ested  and  amused. 

Their  wheels  presently  grated  against  a 
curb,  a  man  in  livery  opened  the  limousine 
door.  Margaret  saw  an  immense  stone 
mansion  facing  the  park,  climbed  a  dazzling 
flight  of  wide  steps,  and  was  in  a  great  hall 
that  faced  an  interior  court,  where  there 
were  Florentine  marble  benches,  and  the 
great  lifted  leaves  of  palms.  She  was  a 
little  dazed  by  crowded  impressions:  im 
pressions  of  height  and  spaciousness  and 
richness,  and  opening  vistas ;  a  great  marble 
stairway,  and  a  landing  where  there  was  an 
immense  designed  window  in  clear  leaded 
glass;  rugs,  tapestries,  mirrors,  polished 
wood  and  great  chairs  with  brocaded  seats 
and  carved  dark  backs.  Two  little  girls, 
heavy,  well-groomed  little  girls — one  spec 
tacled  and  good-natured  looking,  the  other 
rather  pretty,  with  a  mass  of  fair  hair — 
were  coming  down  the  stairs  with  an  eager 
little  German  woman.  They  kissed  their 


MOTHER  73 

mother,  much  diverted  by  the  mad  rushes 
and  leaps  of  the  two  white  poodles  who 
accompanied  them. 

"These  are  my  babies,  Miss  Paget,"  said 
Mrs.  Carr-Boldt.  "This  is  Victoria,  who's 
eleven,  and  Harriet,  who's  six.  And  these 
are  Monsieur " 

"Monsieur  Patou  and  Monsieur  Mouche," 
said  Victoria,  introducing  the  dogs  with  en 
tire  ease  of  manner.  The  German  woman 
said  something  forcibly,  and  Margaret  un 
derstood  the  child's  reply  in  that  tongue: 
"Mamma  won't  blame  you,  Fraulein;  Har 
riet  and  I  wished  them  to  come  down!" 

Presently  they  all  went  up  in  a  luxu 
riously  fitted  little  lift,  Margaret  being  car 
ried  to  the  fourth  floor  to  her  own  rooms, 
to  which  a  little  maid  escorted  her. 

When  the  maid  had  gone  Margaret 
walked  to  the  door  and  tried  it,  for  no  rea 
son  whatever;  it  was  shut.  Her  heart  was 
beating  violently.  She  walked  into  the 
middle  of  the  room  and  looked  at  herself 


74  MOTHER 

in  the  mirror,  and  laughed  a  little  breath 
less  laugh.  Then  she  took  off  her  hat  care 
fully  and  went  into  the  bedroom  that  was 
beyond  her  sitting-room,  and  hung  her  hat 
in  a  fragrant  white  closet  that  was  entirely 
and  delightfully  empty,  and  put  her  coat  on 
a  hanger,  and  her  gloves  and  bag  in  the 
empty  big  top  drawer  of  a  great  mahogany 
bureau.  Then  she  went  back  to  the  mirror 
and  looked  hard  at  her  own  beauty  re 
flected  in  it;  and  laughed  her  little  laugh 
again. 

"It's  too  good — it's  too  much!"  she  whis 
pered. 

She  investigated  her  domain,  after  quell 
ing  a  wild  desire  to  sit  down  at  the  beauti 
ful  desk  and  try  the  new  pens,  the  crystal 
ink-well,  and  the  heavy  paper,  with  its 
severely  engraved  address,  in  a  long  letter 
to  Mother. 

There  was  a  tiny  upright  piano  in  the 
sitting-room,  and  at  the  fireplace  a  deep 
thick  rug,  and  an  immense  leather  arm- 


MOTHER  75 

chair.  A  clock  in  crystal  and  gold  flanked 
by  two  crystal  candlesticks  had  the  centre  of 
the  mantelpiece.  On  the  little  round  ma 
hogany  centre  table  was  a  lamp  with  a  won 
derful  mosaic  shade;  a  little  bookcase  was 
filled  with  books  and  magazines.  Mar 
garet  went  to  one  of  the  three  windows,  and 
looked  down  upon  the  bare  trees  and  the 
snow  in  the  park,  and  upon  the  rumbling 
green  omnibuses,  all  bathed  in  bright  chilly 
sunlight. 

A  mahogany  door  with  a  crystal  knob 
opened  into  the  bedroom,  where  there  was  a 
polished  floor,  and  more  rugs,  and  a  gay 
rosy  wall  paper,  and  a  great  bed  with  a  lace 
cover.  Beyond  was  a  bathroom,  all  enamel, 
marble,  glass,  and  nickel-plate,  with  heavy 
monogrammed  towels  on  the  rack,  three 
new  little  wash-cloths  sealed  in  glazed  paper, 
three  new  toothbrushes  in  paper  cases,  and 
a  cake  of  famous  English  soap  just  out  of 
its  wrapper. 

Over  the  whole  little  suite  there  brooded 


76  MOTHER 

an  exquisite  order.  Not  a  particle  of  dust 
broke  the  shining  surfaces  of  the  mahogany, 
not  a  fallen  leaf  lay  under  the  great  bowl 
of  roses  on  the  desk.  Now  and  then  the 
radiator  clanked  in  the  stillness;  it  was  hard 
to  believe  in  that  warmth  and  silence  that  a 
cold  winter  wind  was  blowing  outside,  and 
that  snow  still  lay  on  the  ground. 

Margaret,  resting  luxuriously  in  the  big 
chair,  became  thoughtful;  presently  she 
went  into  the  bedroom,  and  knelt  down 
beside  the  bed. 

"O  Lord,  let  me  stay  here,"  she  prayed, 
her  face  in  her  hands.  "  I  want  so  to  stay — 
make  me  a  success!" 

Never  was  a  prayer  more  generously 
answered.  Miss  Paget  was  an  instant  suc 
cess.  In  something  less  than  two  months 
she  became  indispensable  to  Mrs.  Carr- 
Boldt,  and  was  a  favorite  with  every  one, 
from  the  rather  stolid,  silent  head  of  the 
house  down  to  the  least  of  the  maids.  She 


"With  notes  and   invitations,  account  books  and  cheque 
books,  dinner  lists  and  interviews  with  caterers,  decorators 
and  florists,  Margaret's  time  was  full." 


MOTHER  77 

was  so  busy,  so  unaffected,  so  sympathetic, 
that  her  sudden  rise  in  favor  was  resented 
by  no  one.  The  butler  told  her  his  troubles,, 
the  French  maid  darkly  declared  that  but 
for  Miss  Paget  she  would  not  for  one  sec 
ond  r-r-remain!  The  children  went  cheer 
fully  even  to  the  dentist  with  their  adored 
Miss  Peggy;  they  soon  preferred  her  escort 
to  matinee  or  zoo  to  that  of  any  other  per 
son.  Margaret  also  escorted  Mrs.  Carr- 
Boldt's  mother,  a  magnificent  old  lady,  on 
shopping  expeditions,  and  attended  the 
meetings  of  charity  boards  for  Mrs.  Carr- 
Boldt.  With  notes  and  invitations,  account 
books  and  cheque  books,  dinner  lists,  and 
interviews  with  caterers,  decorators,  and 
florists,  Margaret's  time  was  full,  but  she 
loved  every  moment  of  her  work,  and  gloried 
in  her  increasing  usefulness. 

At  first  there  were  some  dark  days;  not 
ably  the  dreadful  one  upon  which  Mar 
garet  somehow — somewhere — dropped  the 
box  containing  the  new  hat  she  was  bringing 


78  MOTHER 

home  for  Harriet,  and  kept  the  little  girl 
out  in  the  cold  afternoon  air  while  the 
motor  made  a  fruitless  trip  back  to  the 
milliner's.  Harriet  contracted  a  cold,  and 
Harriet's  mother  for  the  first  time  spoke 
severely  to  Margaret.  There  was  another 
bad  day  when  Margaret  artlessly  admitted 
to  Mrs.  Pierre  Polk  at  the  telephone  that 
Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  was  not  engaged  for  dinner 
that  evening,  thus  obliging  her  employer 
to  snub  the  lady,  or  accept  a  distasteful 
invitation  to  dine.  And  there  was  a  most 
uncomfortable  occasion  when  Mr.  Carr- 
Boldt,  not  at  all  at  his  best,  stumbled  in 
upon  his  wife  with  some  angry  observations 
meant  for  her  ear  alone;  and  Margaret,  busy 
with  accounts  in  a  window  recess,  was,  un 
known  to  them  both,  a  distressed  witness. 

"Another  time,  Miss  Paget,"  said  Mrs. 
Carr-Boldt,  coldly,  upon  Margaret's  ap 
pearing  scarlet-cheeked  between  the  cur 
tains,  "don't  oblige  me  to  ascertain  that  you 
are  not  within  hearing  before  feeling  sure  of 


MOTHER  79 

privacy.  Will  you  finish  those  bills  up 
stairs,  if  you  please?" 

Margaret  went  upstairs  with  a  burning 
heart,  cast  her  bills  haphazard  on  her  own 
desk,  and  flung  herself,  dry-eyed  and  furi 
ous,  on  the  bed.  She  was  far  too  angry  to 
think,  but  lay  there  for  perhaps  twenty 
minutes  with  her  brain  whirling.  Finally 
rising,  she  brushed  up  her  hair,  straight 
ened  her  collar,  and,  full  of  tremendous 
resolves,  stepped  into  her  little  sitting- 
room,  to  find  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  in  the  big 
chair,  serenely  eying  her. 

"I'm  so  sorry  I  spoke  so,  Peggy,"  said 
her  employer,  generously.  "But  the  truth 
is,  I  am  not  myself  when — when  Mr.  Carr- 
Boldt "  The  little  hesitating  appeal  in 

her  voice  completely  disarmed  Margaret. 
In  the  end  the  little  episode  cemented  the 
rapidly  growing  friendship  between  the  two 
women,  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  seeming  to  enjoy 
the  relief  of  speaking  rather  freely  of  what 
was  the  one  real  trial  in  her  life. 


So  MOTHER 

"My  husband  has  always  had  too  much 
money,"  she  said,  in  her  positive  way. 
"At  one  time  we  were  afraid  that  he  would 
absolutely  ruin  his  health  by  this — habit  of 
his.  His  physician  and  I  took  him  around 
the  world — I  left  Victoria,  just  a  baby,  with 
mother — and  for  two  years  he  was  never 
out  of  my  sight.  It  has  never  been  so  bad 
since.  You  know  yourself  how  reliable  he 
usually  is,"  she  finished  cheerfully,  "unless 
some  of  the  other  men  get  hold  of  him!5' 

As  the  months  went  on  Margaret  came  to 
admire  her  employer  more  and  more. 
There  was  not  an  indolent  impulse  in  Mrs. 
Carr-Boldt's  entire  composition.  Smooth- 
haired,  fresh-skinned,  in  spotless  linen,  she 
began  the  day  at  eight  o'clock,  full  of  energy 
and  interest.  She  had  daily  sessions  with 
butler  and  housekeeper,  shopped  with  Mar 
garet  and  the  children,  walked  about  her 
greenhouse  or  her  country  garden  with  her 
skirts  pinned  up,  and  had  tulips  potted  and 
stone  work  continued.  She  was  prominent 


MOTHER  8 1 

in  several  clubs,  a  famous  dinner-giver,  she 
took  a  personal  interest  in  all  her  servants, 
loved  to  settle  their  quarrels  and  have  three 
or  four  of  them  up  on  the  carpet  at  once, 
tearful  and  explanatory.  Margaret  kept 
for  her  a  list  of  some  two  hundred  friends, 
whose  birthdays  were  to  be  marked  with 
carefully  selected  gifts.  She  pleased  Mrs. 
Carr-Boldt  by  her  open  amazement  at  the 
latter's  vitality.  The  girl  observed  that  her 
employer  could  not  visit  any  institution 
without  making  a  few  vigorous  suggestions 
as  she  went  about;  she  accompanied  her 
cheques  to  the  organized  charities — and  her 
charity  flowed  only  through  absolutely 
reliable  channels — with  little  friendly,  ad 
visory  letters.  She  liked  the  democratic 
attitude  for  herself — even  while  promptly 
snubbing  any  such  tendency  in  children  or 
friends — and  told  Margaret  that  she  only 
used  her  coat  of  arms  on  house  linen,  sta 
tionery,  and  livery,  because  her  husband 
and  mother  liked  it.  "It's  of  course  rather 


82  MOTHER 

nice  to  realize  that  one  comes  from  one 
of  the  oldest  of  the  Colonial  families,"  she 
would  say.  "The  Carterets  of  Maryland, 
you  know. — But  it's  all  such  bosh!" 

And  she  urged  Margaret  to  claim  her  own 
right  to  family  honors:  "You're  a  Quincy, 
my  dear!  Don't  let  that  woman  intimidate 
you— she  didn't  remember  that  her  grand 
father  was  a  captain  until  her  husband  made 
his  money.  And  where  the  family  portraits 
came  from  I  don't  know,  but  I  think  there's 
a  man  on  Fourth  Avenue  who  does  'em!" 
she  would  say,  or,  "I  know  all  about  Lilly 
Reynolds,  Peggy.  Her  father  was  as  rich 
as  she  says,  and  I  daresay  the  crest  is  theirs. 
But  ask  her  what  her  maternal  grandmother 
did  for  a  living,  if  you  want  to  shut  her  up !" 
Other  people  she  would  condemn  with  a 
mere  whispered  "Coal!"  or  "Patent  bath 
tubs!"  behind  her  fan,  and  it  pleased  her  to 
tell  people  that  her  treasure  of  a  secretary 
had  the  finest  blood  in  the  world  in  her  veins. 
Margaret  was  much  admired,  and  Mar- 


MOTHER  83 

garet  was  her  discovery,  and  she  liked  to 
emphasize  her  find. 

Mrs.  Carr-Boldt's  mother,  a  tremulous, 
pompous  old  lady,  unwittingly  aided  the 
impression  by  taking  an  immense  fancy  to 
Margaret,  and  by  telling  her  few  intimates 
and  the  older  women  among  her  daughter's 
friends  that  the  girl  was  a  perfect  little  thor 
oughbred.  When  the  Carr-Boldts  filled 
their  house  with  the  reckless  and  noisy 
company  they  occasionally  affected,  Mrs. 
Carteret  would  say  majestically  to  Mar 
garet: 

"  You  and  I  have  nothing  in  common  with 
this  riff-raff,  my  dear!" 

Summer  came,  and  Margaret  headed  a 
happy  letter  "Bar  Harbor."  Two  months 
later  all  Weston  knew  that  Margaret  Paget 
was  going  abroad  for  a  year  with  those  rich 
people,  and  had  written  her  mother  from  the 
Lusitania.  Letters  from  London,  from  Ger 
many,  from  Holland,  from  Russia,  fol- 


84  MOTHER 

lowed.  "We  are  going  to  put  the  girls  at 
school  in  Switzerland,  and  (ahem!)  winter 
on  the  Riviera,  and  then  Rome  for  Holy 
Week!"  she  wrote. 

She  was  presently  home  again,  chattering 
French  and  German  to  amuse  her  father, 
teaching  Becky  a  little  Italian  song  to 
match  her  little  Italian  costume. 

"It's  wonderful  to  me  how  you  get  along 
with  all  these  rich  people,  Mark,"  said 
her  mother,  admiringly,  during  Margaret's 
home  visit.  Mrs.  Paget  was  watering  the 
dejected-looking  side  garden  with  a  strag 
gling  length  of  hose;  Margaret  and  Julie 
shelling  peas  on  the  side  steps.  Margaret 
laughed,  coloring  a  little. 

"Why,  we're  just  as  good  as  they  are, 
Mother!" 

Mrs.  Paget  drenched  a  dried  little  clump 
of  carnations. 

"We're  as  good"  she  admitted;  "but  we're 
not  as  rich  or  as,  travelled — we  haven't  the 
same  ideas ;  we  belong  to  a  different  class." 


MOTHER  85 

"Oh,  no,  we  don't,  Mother/'  Margaret 
said  quickly.  "Who  are  the  Carr-Boldts, 
except  for  their  money?  Why,  Mrs.  Car- 
teret — for  all  her  family! — isn't  half  the 
aristocrat  Grandma  was!  And  you — you 
could  be  a  Daughter  of  The  Officers  of  the 
Revolution,  Mother!" 

"Why,  Mark,  I  never  heard  that!"  her 
mother  protested,  cleaning  the  sprinkler 
with  a  hairpin. 

"Mother!"  Julie  said  eagerly,  "Great 
grandfather  Quincy!" 

"Oh,  Grandpa,"  said  Mrs.  Paget.  "Yes, 
Grandpa  was  a  paymaster.  He  was  on 
Governor  Hancock's  staff.  They  used  to 
call  him  'Major.'  But  Mark—  -"  she 
turned  off  the  water,  holding  her  skirts 
away  from  the  combination  of  mud  and  dust 
underfoot,  "that's  a  very  silly  way  to  talk, 
dear!  Money  does  make  a  difference;  it 
does  no  good  to  go  back  into  the  past  and 
say  that  this  one  was  a  judge  and  that  one  a 
major;  we  must  live  our  lives  where  we  are  /" 


86  MOTHER 

Margaret  had  not  lost  a  wholesome  respect 
for  her  mother's  opinion  in  the  two  years  she 
had  been  away,  but  she  had  lived  in  a  very 
different  world,  and  was  full  of  new  ideas. 

"Mother,  do  you  mean  to  tell  me  that  if 
you  and  Dad  hadn't  had  a  perfect  pack  of 
children,  and  moved  so  much,  and  if  Dad — 
say — had  been  in  that  oil  deal  that  he  said 
he  wished  he  had  the  money  for,  and  we 
still  lived  in  the  brick  house,  that  you 
wouldn't  be  in  every  way  the  equal  of  Mrs. 
Carr-Boldt?" 

"If  you  mean  as  far  as  money  goes,  Mark 
— no.  We  might  have  been  well-to-do  as 
country  people  go,  I  suppose " 

"Exactly!"  said  Margaret;  "and  you 
would  have  been  as  well  off  as  dozens  of  the 
people  who  are  going  about  in  society  this 
minute!  It's  the  merest  chance  that  we 
aren't  rich.  Just  for  instance:  father's 
father  had  twelve  children,  didn't  he? — and 
left  them — how  much  was  it  ? — about  three 
thousand  dollars  apiece " 


MOTHER  87 

"And  a  Godsend  it  was,  too/'  said  her 
mother,  reflectively. 

"But  suppose  Dad  had  been  the  only 
child,  Mother,"  Margaret  persisted,  "he 
would  have  had " 

"He  would  have  had  the  whole  thirty-six 
thousand  dollars,  I  suppose,  Mark." 

"Or  more,"  said  Margaret,  "for  Grand 
father  Paget  was  presumably  spending 
money  on  them  all  the  time." 

"Well,  but  Mark,"  said  Mrs.  Paget, 
laughing  as  at  the  vagaries  of  a  small  child, 
"Father  Paget  did  have  twelve  children — 
and  Daddy  and  I  eight — "  she  sighed,  as 
always,  at  the  thought  of  the  little  son  who 
was  gone — "and  there  you  are!  You  can't 
get  away  from  that,  dear." 

Margaret  did  not  answer.  But  she  thought 
to  herself  that  very  few  people  held  Mother's 
views  of  this  subject. 

Mrs.  Carr-Boldt's  friends,  for  example, 
did  not  accept  increasing  cares  in  this  re 
signed  fashion;  their  lives  were  ideally 


88  MOTHER 

pleasant  and  harmonious  without  the  com 
plicated  responsibilities  of  large  families. 
They  drifted  from  season  to  season  without 
care,  always  free,  always  gay,  always  ir 
reproachably  gowned.  In  winter  there  were 
daily  meetings,  for  shopping,  for  luncheon, 
bridge,  or  tea;  summer  was  filled  with  a 
score  of  country  visits.  There  were  motor- 
trips  for  week-ends,  dinners,  theatre,  and 
the  opera  to  fill  the  evenings,  German  or 
singing  lessons,  manicure,  masseuse,  and 
dressmaker  to  crowd  the  morning  hours  all 
the  year  round.  Margaret  learned  from 
these  exquisite,  fragrant  creatures  the  art 
of  being  perpetually  fresh  and  charming, 
learned  their  methods  of  caring  for  their 
own  beauty,  learned  to  love  rare  toilet 
waters  and  powders,  fine  embroidered  linen 
and  silk  stockings.  There  was  no  particular 
strain  upon  her  wardrobe  now,  nor  upon 
her  purse;  she  could  be  as  dainty  as  she 
liked.  She  listened  to  the  conversations 
that  went  on  about  her — sometimes  critical 


MOTHER  89 

or  unconvinced;  more  often  admiring;  and 
as  she  listened  she  found  slowly  but  cer 
tainly  her  own  viewpoint.  She  was  not 
mercenary.  She  would  not  marry  a  man 
just  for  his  money,  she  decided,  but  just  as 
certainly  she  would  not  marry  a  man  who 
could  not  give  her  a  comfortable  establish 
ment,  a  position  in  society. 

The  man  seemed  in  no  hurry  to  appear; 
as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  men  whom  Margaret 
met  were  openly  anxious  to  evade  marriage, 
even  with  the  wealthy  girls  of  their  own  set. 
Margaret  was  not  concerned;  she  was  too 
happy  to  miss  the  love-making  element; 
the  men  she  saw  were  not  of  a  type  to  inspire 
a  sensible,  busy,  happy  girl  with  any  very 
deep  feeling.  And  it  was  with  generous 
and  perfect  satisfaction  that  she  presently 
had  news  of  Julie's  happy  engagement. 
Julie  was  to  marry  a  young  and  popular 
doctor,  the  only  child  of  one  of  Weston's 
most  prominent  families.  The  little  sister's 
letter  bubbled  joyously  with  news. 


90  MOTHER 

"Harry's  father  is  going  to  build  us  a 
little  house  on  the  big  place,  the  darling," 
wrote  Julie;  "and  we  will  stay  with  them 
until  it  is  done.  But  in  five  years  Harry 
says  we  will  have  a  real  honeymoon,  in 
Europe!  Think  of  going  to  Europe  as  a 
married  woman.  Mark,  I  wish  you  could 
see  my  ring;  it  is  a  beauty,  but  don't  tell 
Mother  I  was  silly  enough  to  write  about 
it!" 

Margaret  delightedly  selected  a  little 
collection  of  things  for  Julie's  trousseau.  A 
pair  of  silk  stockings,  a  scarf  she  never  had 
worn,  a  lace  petticoat,  pink  silk  for  a  waist. 
Mrs.  Carr-Boldt,  coming  in  in  the  midst  of 
these  preparations,  insisted  upon  adding  so 
many  other  things,  from  trunks  and  closets, 
that  Margaret  was  speechless  with  delight. 
Scarves,  cobwebby  silks  in  uncut  lengths, 
embroidered  lingerie  still  in  the  tissue  paper 
of  Paris  shops,  parasols,  gloves,  and  lengths 
of  lace — she  piled  all  of  them  into  Mar 
garet's  arms.  Julie's  trousseau  was  conse- 


MOTHER  91 

quently  quite  the  most  beautiful  Weston 
had  ever  seen;  and  the  little  sister's  cloud 
less  joy  made  the  fortnight  Margaret  spent 
at  home  at  the  time  of  the  wedding  a  very 
happy  one.  It  was  a  time  of  rush  and 
flurry,  laughter  and  tears,  of  roses,  and  girls 
in  white  gowns.  But  some  ten  days  before 
the  wedding  Julie  and  Margaret  happened 
to  be  alone  for  a  peaceful  hour  over  their 
sewing,  and  fell  to  talking  seriously. 

"You  see,  our  house  will  be  small/'  said 
Julie;  "but  I  don't  care — we  don't  intend 
to  stay  in  Weston  all  our  lives.  Don't 
breathe  this  to  any  one,  Mark,  but  if  Harry 
does  as  well  as  he's  doing  now  for  two  years, 
we'll  rent  the  little  house,  and  we're  going 
to  Baltimore  for  a  year  for  a  special  course. 
Then — you  know  he's  devoted  to  Doctor 
McKim,  he  always  calls  him  'the  chief — 
then  he  thinks  maybe  McKim  will  work 
him  into  his  practice — he's  getting  old,  you 
know,  and  that  means  New  York!" 

"Oh,Ju— r  folly!" 


92  MOTHER 

"I  don't  see  why  not,"  Julie  said,  dim 
pling.  "Harry's  crazy  to  do  it.  He  says 
he  doesn't  propose  to  live  and  die  in  Weston. 
McKim  could  throw  any  amount  of  hospital 
practice  his  way,  to  begin  with.  And  you 
know  Harry'll  have  something — and  the 
house  will  rent.  I'm  crazy,"  said  Julie, 
enthusiastically,  "  to  take  one  of  those  lovely 
old  apartments  on  Washington  Square,  and 
meet  a  few  nice  people,  you  know,  and  really 
make  something  of  my  life!" 

"Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  and  I  will  spin  down 
for  you  every  few  days,"  Margaret  said, 
falling  readily  in  with  the  plan.  "I'm  glad 
you're  not  going  to  simply  get  into  a  rut  the 
way  some  of  the  other  girls  have,  cooking 
and  babies  and  nothing  else!"  she  said. 

"I  think  that's  an  awful  mistake,"  Julie 
said  placidly.  "Starting  in  right  is  so  im 
portant.  I  don't  want  to  be  a  mere  drudge 
like  Ethel  or  Louise — they  may  like  it.  I 
don't !  Of  course,  this  isn't  a  matter  to  talk 
of,"  she  went  on,  coloring  a  little.  "I'd 


MOTHER  93 

never  breathe  this  to  Mother!  But  it's 
perfectly  absurd  to  pretend  that  girls  don't 
discuss  these  things.  I've  talked  to  Betty 
and  Louise — we  all  talk  about  it,  you  know. 
And  Louise  says  they  haven't  had  one  free 
second  since  Buddy  came.  She  can't  keep 
one  maid,  and  she  says  the  idea  of  two  maids 
eating  their  three  meals  a  day,  whether 
she's  home  or  not,  makes  her  perfectly 
sick!  Some  one's  got  to  be  with  him  every 
single  second,  even  now,  when  he's  four — 
to  see  that  he  doesn't  fall  off  something  or 
put  things  in  his  mouth.  And  as  Louise 
says — it  means  no  more  week-end  trips; 
you  can't  go  visiting  overnight,  you  can't 
even  go  for  a  day's  drive  or  a  day  on  the 
beach,  without  extra  clothes  for  the  baby, 
a  mosquito-net  and  an  umbrella  for  the 
baby — milk  packed  in  ice  for  the  baby — 
somebody  trying  to  get  the  baby  to  take  his 
nap — it's  awful!  It  would  end  our  Balti 
more  plan,  and  that  means  New  York,  and 
New  York  means  everything  to  Harry  and 


94  MOTHER 

me!"  finished  Julie,  contentedly,  flattening 
a  finished  bit  of  embroidery  on  her  knee,  and 
regarding  it  complacently. 

"Well,  I  think  you're  right,"  Margaret 
approved.  "Things  are  different  now  from 
what  they  were  in  Mother's  day." 

"And  look  at  Mother,"  Julie  said.  "One 
long  slavery!  Life's  too  short  to  wear 
yourself  out  that  way!" 

Mrs.  Paget's  sunny  cheerfulness  was 
sadly  shaken  when  the  actual  moment  of 
parting  with  the  exquisite,  rose-hatted, 
gray-frocked  Julie  came;  her  face  worked 
pitifully  in  its  effort  to  smile;  her  tall  figure, 
awkward  in  an  ill-made,  unbecoming  new 
silk,  seemed  to  droop  tenderly  over  the  little 
clinging  wife.  Margaret,  stirred  by  the 
sight  of  tears  on  her  mother's  face,  stood  with 
an  arm  about  her,  when  the  bride  and  groom 
drove  away  in  the  afternoon  sunshine. 

"I'm  going  to  stay  with  you  until  she 
gets  back!"  she  reminded  her  mother. 


MOTHER  95 

"And  you  know  you've  always  said  you 
wanted  the  girls  to  marry,  Mother,"  urged 
Mr.  Paget.  Rebecca  felt  this  a  felicitous 
moment  to  ask  if  she  and  the  boys  could 
have  the  rest  of  the  ice  cream. 

"Divide  it  evenly,"  said  Mrs.  Paget,  wip 
ing  her  eyes  and  smiling.  "Yes,  I  know, 
Daddy  dear,  I'm  an  ungrateful  woman!  I 
suppose  your  turn  will  come  next,  Mark,  and 
then  I  don't  know  what  I  will  do!" 


CHAPTER  IV 

BUT  Margaret's  turn  did  not  come  for 
nearly  a  year.  Then — in  Germany 
again,  and  lingering  at  a  great 
Berlin  hotel  because  the  spring  was  so  beau 
tiful,  and  the  city  so  sweet  with  linden 
bloom,  and  especially  because  there  were 
two  Americans  at  the  hotel  whose  game  of 
bridge  it  pleased  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt 
daily  to  hope  they  could  match — then  Mar 
garet  transformed  within  a  few  hours  from 
a  merely  pretty,  very  dignified,  perfectly 
contented  secretary,  entirely  satisfied  with 
what  she  wore  as  long  as  it  was  suitable 
and  fresh,  into  a  living  woman  whose 
cheeks  paled  and  flushed  at  nothing  but 
her  thoughts,  who  laughed  at  herself  in 
her  mirror,  loitered  over  her  toilet  try 
ing  one  gown  after  another,  and  walked 
96 


MOTHER  97 

half-smiling  through  a  succession  of  rosy 
dreams. 

It  all  came  about  very  simply.  One  of 
the  aforementioned  bridge  players  won 
dered  if  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  and  her  niece — 
oh,  wasn't  it? — her  secretary  then — would 
like  to  hear  a  very  interesting  young  Amer 
ican  professor  lecture  this  morning? — won 
dered,  when  they  were  fanning  themselves 
in  the  airy  lecture-room,  if  they  would  care 
to  meet  Professor  Tenison? 

Margaret  looked  into  a  pair  of  keen, 
humorous  eyes,  answered  with  her  own  smile 
Professor  Tenison's  sudden  charming  one, 
lost  her  small  hand  in  his  big  firm  one. 
Then  she  listened  to  him  talk,  as  he  strode 
about  the  platform,  boyishly  shaking  back 
the  hair  that  fell  across  his  forehead.  After 
that  he  walked  to  the  hotel  with  them, 
through  dazzling  seas  of  perfume,  and  of 
flowers,  under  the  enchanted  shifting  green 
of  great  trees — or  so  Margaret  thought. 
There  was  a  plunge  from  the  hot  street  into 


98  MOTHER 

the  awninged  cool  gloom  of  the  hotel,  and 
then  a  luncheon,  when  the  happy  steady 
murmur  from  their  own  table  seemed  echoed 
by  the  murmurous  clink  and  stir  and 
laughter  all  about  them,  and  accented  by  the 
not-too-close  music  from  the  band. 

Doctor  Tenison  was  everything  charm 
ing,  Margaret  thought,  instantly  drawn  by 
the  unaffected,  friendly  manner,  and  watch 
ing  the  interested  gleam  of  his  blue  eyes  and 
the  white  flash  of  his  teeth.  He  was  a 
gentleman,  to  begin  with;  distinguished  at 
thirty-two  in  his  chosen  work;  big  and  well- 
built,  without  suggesting  the  athlete,  of  an 
old  and  honored  American  family,  and  the 
only  son  of  a  rich — and  eccentric — old  doc 
tor  whom  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  chanced  to  know. 

He  was  frankly  delighted  at  the  chance 
that  had  brought  him  in  contact  with  these 
charming  people;  and  as  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt 
took  an  instant  fancy  to  him,  and  as  he  was 
staying  at  their  own  hotel,  they  saw  him 
after  that  every  day,  and  several  times  a 


MOTHER  99 

day.  Margaret  would  come  down  the  great 
sun-bathed  stairway  in  the  morning  to  find 
him  patiently  waiting  in  a  porch  chair. 
Her  heart  would  give  a  great  leap — half 
joy,  half  new  strange  pain,  as  she  recognized 
him.  There  would  be  time  for  a  chat  over 
their  fruit  and  eggs  before  Mr.  Carr-Boldt 
came  down,  all  ready  for  a  motor-trip,  or 
Mrs.  Carr-Boldt,  swathed  in  cream-colored 
coat  and  flying  veils,  joined  them  with  an 
approving  "Good-morning." 

Margaret  would  remember  these  break 
fasts  all  her  life:  the  sun-splashed  little 
table  in  a  corner  of  the  great  dining-room, 
the  rosy  fatherly  waiter  who  was  so  much 
delighted  with  her  German,  the  busy  pic 
turesque  traffic  in  the  street  just  below  the 
wide-open  window.  She  would  always  re 
member  a  certain  filmy  silk  striped  gown,  a 
wide  hat  loaded  with  daisies;  always  love 
the  odor  of  linden  trees  in  the  spring. 

Sometimes  the  professor  went  with  them 
on  their  morning  drive,  to  be  dropped  at  the 


ioo  MOTHER 

lecture-hall  with  Margaret  and  Mrs.  Carr- 
Boldt.  The  latter  was  pleased  to  take  the 
course  of  lectures  very  seriously,  and  carried 
a  handsome  Russian  leather  note-book,  and 
a  gold  pencil.  Sometimes  after  luncheon 
they  all  went  on  an  expedition  together,  and 
now  and  then  Margaret  and  Doctor  Tenison 
went  off  alone  on  foot,  to  explore  the  city. 
They  would  end  the  afternoon  with  coffee 
and  little  cakes  in  some  tea-room,  and  come 
home  tired  and  merry  in  the  long  shadows  of 
the  spring  sunset,  with  wilted  flowers  from 
the  street  markets  in  their  hands. 

There  was  one  glorious  tramp  in  the  rain, 
when  the  professor's  great  laugh  rang  out 
like  a  boy's  for  sheer  high  spirits,  and  when 
Margaret  was  an  enchanting  vision  in  her 
long  coat,  with  her  cheeks  glowing  through 
the  blown  wet  tendrils  of  her  hair.  That 
day  they  had  tea  in  the  deserted  charming 
little  parlor  of  a  tiny  inn,  and  drank  it  toast 
ing  their  feet  over  a  glowing  fire. 

"Is  Mrs.   Carr-Boldt  your  mother's  or 


MOTHER  101 

your  father's  sister?"  John  Tenison  asked, 
watching  his  companion  with  approval. 

"Oh,  good  gracious!"  said  Margaret, 
laughing  over  her  teacup.  "Haven't  I  told 
you  yet  that  I'm  only  her  secretary  ?  I  never 
saw  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  until  five  years  ago." 

"Perhaps  you  did  tell  me.  But  I  got  it 
into  my  head,  that  first  day,  that  you  were 
aunt  and  niece " 

"People  do,  I  think,"  Margaret  said 
thoughtfully,  "because  we're  both  fair." 
She  did  not  say  that  but  for  Mrs.  Carr- 
Boldt's  invaluable  maid  the  likeness  would 
have  been  less  marked,  on  this  score  at 
least.  "I  taught  school,"  she  went  on 
simply,  "and  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  happened 
to  come  to  my  school,  and  she  asked  me  to 
come  to  her." 

"You're  all  alone  in  the  world,  Miss 
Paget?"  He  was  eying  her  musingly;  the 
direct  question  came  quite  naturally. 

"Oh,  dear  me,  no !  My  father  and  mother 
are  living";  and  feeling,  as  she  always  did, 


102  MOTHER 

a  little  claim  on  her  loyalty,  she  added: 
"We  are,  or  were,  rather,  Southern  people 
— but  my  father  settled  in  a  very  small  New 
York  town " 

"Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  told  me  that — I'd  for 
gotten "  said  Professor  Tenison,  and  he 

carried  the  matter  entirely  out  of  Margar 
et's  hands — much,  much  further  indeed 
than  she  would  have  carried  it,  by  contin 
uing,  "She  tells  me  that  Quincyport  was 
named  for  your  mother's  grandfather,  and 
that  Judge  Paget  was  your  father's  father." 

"Father's  uncle,"  Margaret  corrected, 
although  as  a  matter  of  fact  Judge  Paget 
had  been  no  nearer  than  her  father's  second 
cousin.  "But  father  always  called  him 
uncle,"  Margaret  assured  herself  inwardly. 
To  the  Quincyport  claim  she  said  nothing. 
Quincyport  was  in  the  county  that  Mother's 
people  had  come  from;  Quincy  was  a  very 
unusual  name,  and  the  original  Quincy  had 
been  a  Charles,  which  certainly  was  one  of 
Mother's  family  names.  Margaret  and 


MOTHER  103 

Julie,  browsing  about  among  the  colonial 
histories  and  genealogies  of  the  Weston  Pub 
lic  Library  years  before,  had  come  to  a 
jubilant  certainty  that  Mother's  grand 
father  must  have  been  the  same  man.  But 
she  did  not  feel  quite  so  positive  now. 

"Your  people  aren't  still  in  the  South, 
you  said?" 

"Oh,  no!"  Margaret  cleared  her  throat. 
"They're  in  Weston— Weston,  New  York." 

"Weston  !    Not  near  Dayton?" 

"Why,  yes!    Do  you  know  Dayton?" 

"Do  I  know  Dayton?"  He  was  like  an 
eager  child.  "Why,  my  Aunt  Pamela  lives 
there;  the  only  mother  I  ever  knew!  I 
knew  Weston,  too,  a  little.  Lovely  homes 
there,  some  of  them — old  colonial  houses. 
And  your  mother  lives  there?  Is  she  fond 
of  flowers?" 

"She  loves  them,"  Margaret  said,  vaguely 
uncomfortable. 

"Well,  she  must  know  Aunt  Pamela," 
said  John  Tenison,  enthusiastically.  "I 


104  MOTHER 

expect  they'd  be  great  friends.  And  you 
must  know  Aunt  Pam.  She's  like  a  dainty 
old  piece  of  china,  or  a — I  don't  know,  a 
tea  rose!  She's  never  married,  and  she 
lives  in  the  most  charming  brick  house, 
with  brick  walls  and  hollyhocks  all  about 
it,  and  such  an  atmosphere  inside!  She 
has  an  old  maid  and  an  old  gardener,  and 
— don't  you  know — she's  the  sort  of  woman 
who  likes  to  sit  down  under  a  portrait  of 
your  great-grandfather,  in  a  dim  parlor  full 
of  mahogany  and  rose  jars,  with  her  black 
silk  skirts  spreading  about  her,  and  an  Old 
Blue  cup  in  her  hand,  and  talk  family — how 
cousin  this  married  a  man  whose  people 
aren't  anybody,  and  cousin  that  is  outraging 
precedent  by  naming  her  child  for  her 
husband's  side  of  the  house.  She's  a  funny, 
dear  old  lady!  You  know,  Miss  Paget," 
the  professor  went  on,  with  his  eager,  im 
personal  air,  "when  I  met  you,  I  thought  you 
didn't  quite  seem  like  a  New  Yorker  and  a 
Bar  Harborer — if  that's  the  word!  Aunt 


MOTHER  105 

Pam — you  know  she's  my  only  mother,  I  got 
all  my  early  knowledge  from  her! — Aunt 
Pam  detests  the  usual  New  York  girl,  and 
the  minute  I  met  you  I  knew  she'd  like  you. 
You'd  sort  of  fit  into  the  Dayton  picture, 
with  your  braids,  and  those  ruffly  things  you 
wear!" 

Margaret  said  simply,  "I  would  love  to 
meet  her,"  and  began  slowly  to  draw  on  her 
gloves.  It  surely  was  not  requisite  that 
she  should  add,  "  But  you  must  not  confuse 
my  home  with  any  such  exquisitely  ordered 
existence  as  that.  We  are  poor  people, 
our  house  is  crowded,  our  days  a  severe  and 
endless  struggle  with  the  ugly  things  of  life. 
We  have  good  blood  in  our  veins,  but  not 
more  than  hundreds  of  thousands  of  other 
American  families.  My  mother  would  not 
understand  one  tenth  of  your  aunt's  con 
versation;  your  aunt  would  find  very  un 
interesting  the  things  that  are  vital  to  my 
mother." 

No,  she  couldn't  say  that.     She  picked 


106  MOTHER 

up  her  dashing  little  hat,  and  pinned  it 
over  her  loosened  soft  mass  of  yellow  hair, 
and  buttoned  up  her  storm  coat,  and 
plunged  her  hands  deep  in  her  pockets. 
No,  the  professor  would  call  on  her  at 
Bar  Harbor,  take  a  yachting  trip  with  the 
Carr-Boldts  perhaps,  and  then — and  then, 
when  they  were  really  good  friends,  some 
day  she  would  ask  Mother  to  have  a  simple 
little  luncheon,  and  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  would 
let  her  bring  Doctor  Tenison  down  in  the 
motor  from  New  York.  And  meantime — no 
need  to  be  too  explicit. 

For  just  two  happy  weeks  Margaret 
lived  in  Wonderland.  The  fourteen  days 
were  a  revelation  to  her.  Life  seemed  to 
grow  warmer,  more  rosy-colored.  Little 
things  became  significant;  every  moment 
carried  its  freight  of  joy.  Her  beauty, 
always  notable,  became  almost  startling; 
there  was  a  new  glow  in  her  cheeks  and  lips, 
new  fire  in  the  dark-lashed  eyes  that  were 
so  charming  a  contrast  to  her  bright  hair. 


•  2 

•      4> 


O     3 
•SS     S, 

a 


MOTHER  107 

Like  a  pair  of  joyous  and  irresponsible 
children  she  and  John  Tenison  walked 
through  the  days,  too  happy  ever  to  pause 
and  ask  themselves  whither  they  were  going. 

Then  abruptly  it  ended.  Victoria,  brought 
down  from  school  in  Switzerland  with 
various  indications  of  something  wrong,  was 
in  a  flash  a  sick  child;  a  child  who  must  be 
hurried  home  to  the  only  surgeon  in  whom 
Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  placed  the  least  trust. 
There  was  hurried  packing,  telephoning, 
wiring;  it  was  only  a  few  hours  after  the 
great  German  physician's  diagnosis  that 
they  were  all  at  the  railway  station,  breath 
less,  nervous,  eager  to  get  started. 

Doctor  Tenison  accompanied  them  to  the 
station,  and  in  the  five  minutes'  wait  before 
their  train  left,  a  little  incident  occurred, 
the  memory  of  which  clouded  Margaret's 
dreams  for  many  a  day  to  come.  Arriving, 
as  they  were  departing,  were  the  St.  George 
Aliens,  noisy,  rich,  arrogant  New  Yorkers, 
for  whom  Margaret  had  a  special  dislike. 


io8  MOTHER 

The  Aliens  fell  joyously  upon  the  Carr- 
Boldt  party,  with  a  confusion  of  greetings. 
"And  Jack  Tenison!"  shouted  Lily  Allen, 
delightedly.  "Well,  what  fun!  What  are 
you  doing  here?" 

"I'm  feeling  a  little  lonely,"  said  the 
professor,  smiling  at  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt. 

"Nothing  like  that;  unsay  them  woyds," 
said  Maude  Allen,  cheerfully.  "Mamma, 
make  him  dine  with  us !  Say  you  will." 

"I  assure  you  I  was  dreading  the  lonely 
evening,"  John  Tenison  said  gratefully. 
Margaret's  last  glimpse  of  his  face  was  be 
tween  Lily's  pink  and  cherry  hat  and 
Maude's  astonishing  headgear  of  yellow 
straw,  gold  braid,  spangled  quills,  and  calla 
lilies.  She  carried  a  secret  heartache  through 
the  worried  fortnight  of  Victoria's  illness 
and  the  busy  days  that  followed;  for  Mrs. 
Carr-Boldt  had  one  of  many  nervous  break 
downs,  and  took  her  turn  at  the  hospital 
when  Victoria  came  home.  For  the  first 
time  in  five  happy  years  Margaret  drooped, 


MOTHER  109 

and  for  the  first  time  a  longing  for  money 
and  power  of  her  own  gnawed  at  the  girl's 
heart.  If  she  had  but  her  share  of  these 
things,  she  could  hold  her  own  against  a 
hundred  Maude  and  Lily  Aliens. 

As  it  was,  she  told  herself  a  little  bitterly, 
she  was  only  a  secretary,  one  of  the  hundred 
paid  dependents  of  a  rich  woman.  She  was 
only,  after  all,  a  little  middle-class  country 
school  teacher. 


CHAPTER  V 

SO    YOU'RE    going    home    to    your 
own  people  for  the  week-end,  Peggy? 
And  how   many  of  you   are  there, 
I  always  forget?"  said  young  Mrs.  George 
Crawford,  negligently.     She  tipped  back  in 
her  chair,  half  shut  her  novel,  half  shut  her 
eyes,   and  looked  critically  at  her  finger 
nails. 

Outside  the  big  country  house  summer 
sunshine  flooded  the  smooth  lawns,  sparkled 
on  the  falling  diamonds  and  still  pool  of  the 
fountain,  glowed  over  acres  of  matchless 
wood  and  garden.  But  deep  awnings  made 
a  clear  cool  shade  indoors,  and  the  wide 
rooms  were  delightfully  breezy. 

Margaret,  busy  with  a  ledger  and  cheque 
book,  smiled  absently,  finished  a  long  column, 
made  an  orderly  entry,  and  wiped  her  pen. 

no 


MOTHER  in 

"Seven,"  said  she,  smiling. 

"Seven !"  echoed  Mrs.  Potter,  lazily. 
"My  heaven — seven  children!  How  early 
Victorian!" 

"Isn't  it?"  said  a  third  woman,  a  very 
beautiful  woman,  Mrs.  Watts  Watson,  who 
was  also  idling  and  reading  in  the  white-and- 
gray  morning-room.  "Well,"  she  added, 
dropping  her  magazine,  and  locking  her 
hands  about  her  head,  "my  grandmother  had 
ten.  Fancy  trying  to  raise  ten  children!" 

"Oh,  everything's  different  now,"  the 
first  speaker  said  indifferently.  "Every 
thing's  more  expensive,  life  is  more  com 
plicated.  People  used  to  have  roomier 
houses,  aunts  and  cousins  and  grandmothers 
living  with  them;  there  was  always  some 
one  at  home  with  the  children.  Nowadays 
we  don't  do  that." 

"And  thank  the  saints  we  don't!"  said 
Mrs.  Watson,  piously.  "If  there's  one 
thing  I  can't  stand,  it's  a  houseful  of  things- 
in-law!" 


ii2  MOTHER 

" Of  course;  but  I  mean  it  made  the  family 
problem  simpler/'  Mrs.  Crawford  pursued. 
"Oh — and  I  don't  know!  Everything  was 
so  simple.  All  this  business  of  sterilizing, 
and  fumigating,  and  pasteurizing,  and  vac 
cinating,  and  boiling  in  boracic  acid  wasn't 
done  in  those  days,"  she  finished  vaguely. 

"Now  there  you  are — now  there  you  are!" 
said  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt,  entering  into  the 
conversation  with  sudden  force.  Entirely 
recovered  after  her  nervous  collapse,  as 
brisk  as  ever  in  her  crisp  linen  gown,  she 
was  signing  the  cheques  that  Margaret 
handed  her,  frowningly  busy  and  absorbed 
with  her  accounts.  Now  she  leaned  back 
in  her  chair,  glanced  at  the  watch  at  her 
wrist,  and  relaxed  the  cramped  muscles  of 
her  body.  "That's  exactly  it,  Rose,"  said 
she  to  Mrs.  Crawford.  "Life  is  more  com 
plicated.  People — the  very  people  who 
ought  to  have  children — simply  cannot 
afford  it!  And  who's  to  blame?  Can  you 
blame  a  woman  whose  life  is  packed  full  of 


MOTHER  113 

other  things  she  simply  cannot  avoid,  if  she 
declines  to  complicate  things  any  further? 
Our  grandmothers  didn't  have  telephones, 
or  motor-cars,  or  week-end  affairs,  or 
even — for  that  matter — manicures  and 
hair-dressers!  A  good  heavy  silk  was  full 
dress  all  the  year  'round.  They  washed 
their  own  hair.  The  *  upstairs  girl '  answered 
the  door-bell — why,  they  didn't  even  have 
talcum  powder  and  nursery  refrigerators, 
and  sanitary  rugs  that  have  to  be  washed 
every  day!  Do  you  suppose  my  grand 
mother  ever  took  a  baby's  temperature,  or 
had  its  eyes  and  nose  examined,  or  its  ade 
noids  cut?  They  had  more  children,  and 
they  lost  more  children — without  any  reason 
or  logic  whatever.  Poor  things,  they  never 
thought  of  doing  anything  else,  I  suppose ! 
A  fat  old  darky  nurse  brought  up  the  whole 
crowd — it  makes  one  shudder  to  think  of 
it !  Why,  I  had  always  a  trained  nurse,  and 
the  regular  nurse  used  to  take  two  baths  a 
day.  I  insisted  on  that^  and  both  nurseries 


n4  MOTHER 

were  washed  out  every  day  with  chloride  of 
potash  solution,  and  the  iron  beds  washed 
every  week!  And  even  then  Vic  had  this 
mastoid  trouble,  and  Harriet  got  every 
thing,  almost." 

"Exactly,"  said  Mrs.  Watson.  "That's 
you,  Hattie,  with  all  the  money  in  the  world. 
Now  do  you  wonder  that  some  of  the  rest 
of  us,  who  have  to  think  of  money — in 
short,"  she  finished  decidedly,  "do  you 
wonder  that  people  are  not  having  children  ? 
At  first,  naturally,  one  doesn't  want  them — 
for  three  or  four  years,  I'm  sure,  the  thought 
doesn't  come  into  one's  head.  But  then, 
afterward — you  see,  I've  been  married  fif 
teen  years  now! — afterward,  I  think  it  would 
be  awfully  nice  to  have  one  or  two  little 
kiddies,  if  it  was  a  possible  thing.  But  it 


isn't." 


"No,  it  isn't,"  Mrs.  Crawford  agreed. 
"You  don't  want  to  have  them  unless  you're 
able  to  do  everything  in  the  world  for  them. 
If  I  were  Hat  here,  I'd  have  a  dozen." 


MOTHER  115 

"Oh,  no,  you  wouldn't,"  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt 
assured  her  promptly.  "No,  you  wouldn't ! 
You  can't  leave  everything  to  servants — 
there  are  clothes  to  think  of,  and  dentists, 
and  special  teachers,  and  it's  frightfully 
hard  to  get  a  nursery  governess.  And  then 
you've  got  to  see  that  they  know  the  right 
people — don't  you  know? — and  give  them 
parties — I  tell  you  it's  a  strain." 

"Well,  I  don't  believe  my  mother  with 
her  seven  ever  worked  any  harder  than  you 
do!"  said  Margaret,  with  the  admiration 
in  her  eyes  that  was  so  sweet  to  the  older 
woman.  "Look  at  this  morning — did  you 
sit  down  before  you  came  in  here  twenty 
minutes  ago?" 

"I?  Indeed  I  didn't!"  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt 
said.  "I  had  my  breakfast  and  letters  at 
seven,  bath  at  eight,  straightened  out  that 
squabble  between  Swann  and  the  cook — I 
think  Paul  is  still  simmering,  but  that's 
neither  here  nor  there! — then  I  went  down 
with  the  vet  to  see  the  mare.  Joe'll  never 


ii6  MOTHER 

forgive  me  if  I've  really  broken  the  crea 
ture's  knees! — then  I  telephoned  mother, 
and  saw  Harriet's  violin  man,  and  talked 
to  that  Italian  Joe  sent  up  to  clean  the  oils — 
he's  in  the  gallery  now,  and — let's  see " 

"Italian  lesson,"  Margaret  prompted. 

"Italian  lesson,"  the  other  echoed,  "and 
then  came  in  here  to  sign  my  cheques." 

'You're  so  executive,  Harriet!"  said 
Mrs.  Crawford,  languidly. 

"Apropos  of  Swann,"  Margaret  said,  "he 
confided  to  me  that  he  has  seven  children — 
on  a  little  farm  down  on  Long  Island." 

"The  butler— oh,  I  dare  say!"  Mrs.  Wat 
son  agreed.  "They  can,  because  they've 
no  standard  to  maintain — seven,  or  seven 
teen — the  only  difference  in  expense  is  the 
actual  amount  of  bread  and  butter  con 
sumed." 

"It's  too  bad,"  said  Mrs.  Crawford. 
"But  you've  got  to  handle  the  question 
sanely  and  reasonably,  like  any  other. 
Now,  I  love  children,"  she  went  on.  "I'm 


MOTHER  117 

perfectly  crazy  about  my  sister's  little  girl. 
She's  eleven  now,  and  the  cutest  thing  alive. 
But  when  I  think  of  all  Mabel's  been 
through,  since  she  was  born — I  realize  that 
it's  a  little  too  much  to  expect  of  any  woman. 
Now,  look  at  us — there  are  thousands  of 
people  fixed  as  we  are.  We're  in  an  apart 
ment  hotel,  with  one  maid.  There's  no 
room  for  a  second  maid,  no  porch  and  no 
backyard.  Well,  the  baby  comes — one 
loses,  before  and  after  the  event,  just  about 
six  months  of  everything,  and  of  course  the 
expense  is  frightful,  but  no  matter! — the 
baby  comes.  We  take  a  house.  That 
means  three  indoor  maids,  George's  chauf 
feur,  a  man  for  lawn  and  furnace — that's 
five " 

"Doubling  expenses,"  said  Mrs.  Carr- 
Boldt,  thoughtfully. 

"Doubling !  Trebling,  or  more.  But 

that's  not  all.  Baby  must  be  out  from 
eleven  to  three  every  day.  So  you've  got 
to  go  sit  by  the  carriage  in  the  park  while 


n8  MOTHER 

nurse  goes  home  for  her  lunch.  Or,  if 
you're  out  for  luncheon,  or  giving  a  lunch 
eon,  she  brings  baby  home,  bumps  the  car 
nage  into  the  basement,  carries  the  baby 
upstairs,  eats  her  lunch  in  snatches — the 
maids  don't  like  it,  and  I  don't  blame  them ! 
I  know  how  it  was  with  Mabel;  she  had  to 
give  up  that  wonderful  old  apartment  of 
theirs  on  Gramercy  Park.  Sid  had  his 
studio  on  the  top  floor,  and  she  had  such  a 
lovely  flat  on  the  next  floor,  but  there  was  no 
lift,  and  no  laundry,  and  the  kitchen  was 
small — a  baby  takes  so  much  fussing!  And 
then  she  lost  that  splendid  cook  of  hers, 
Germaine.  She  wouldn't  stand  it.  Up  to 
that  time  she'd  been  cooking  and  waiting, 
too,  but  the  baby  ended  that.  Mabel  took 
a  house,  and  Sid  paid  studio  rent  besides,  and 
they  had  two  maids,  and  then  three  maids — 
and  what  with  their  fighting,  and  their  days 
off,  and  eternally  changing,  Mabel  was  a 
wreck.  I've  seen  her  trying  to  play  a  bridge 
hand  with  Dorothy  bobbing  about  on  her 


MOTHER  119 

arm — poor  girl!  Finally  they  went  to  a 
hotel,  and  of  course  the  child  got  older,  and 
was  less  trouble.  But  to  this  day  Mabel 
doesn't  dare  leave  her  alone  for  one  second. 
And  when  they  go  out  to  dinner,  and  leave 
her  alone  in  the  hotel,  of  course  the  child 

cries !" 

"That's  the  worst  of  a  kiddie,"  Mrs. 
Watson  said.  "You  can't  ever  turn  'em 
off,  as  it  were,  or  make  it  spades !  They're 
always  right  on  the  job.  I'll  never  forget 
Elsie  Clay.  She  was  the  best  friend  I  had 
— my  bridesmaid,  too.  She  married,  and 
after  a  while  they  took  a  house  in  Jersey 
because  of  the  baby.  I  went  out  there  to 
lunch  one  day.  There  she  was  in  a  house 
perfectly  buried  in  trees,  with  the  rain  sop 
ping  down  outside,  and  smoke  blowing  out 
of  the  fireplace,  and  the  drawing-room  as 
dark  as  pitch  at  two  o'clock.  Elsie  said 
she  used  to  nearly  die  of  loneliness,  sitting 
there  all  afternoon  long  listening  to  the 
trains  whistling,  and  the  maid  thumping 


120  MOTHER 

irons  in  the  kitchen,  and  picking  up  the 
baby's  blocks.  And  they  quarrelled,  you 
know,  she  and  her  husband — that  was  the 
beginning  of  the  trouble.  Finally  the  boy 
went  to  his  grandmother,  and  now  I  believe 
Elsie's  married  again,  and  living  in  Cali 
fornia  somewhere." 

Margaret,  hanging  over  the  back  of  her 
chair,  was  an  attentive  listener. 

"But  people — people  in  town  have  chil 
dren!"  she  said.  "The  Blankenships  have 
one,  and  haven't  the  de  Normandys?" 

"The  Blankenship  boy  is  in  college,"  said 
Mrs.  Carr-Boldt;  "and  the  little  de  Nor 
mandys  lived  with  their  grandmother  until 
they  were  old  enough  for  boarding-school." 

"Well,  the  Deanes  have  three!"  Mar 
garet  said  triumphantly. 

"Ah,  well,  my  dear!  Harry  Deane's  a 
rich  man,  and  she  was  a  Pell  of  Philadel 
phia,"  Mrs.  Crawford  supplied  promptly. 
"Now  the  Eastmans  have  three,  too,  with  a 
trained  nurse  apiece." 


MOTHER  121 

"I  see/'  Margaret  admitted  slowly. 

"Far  wiser  to  have  none  at  all,"  said 
Mrs.  Carr-Boldt,  in  her  decisive  way,  "than 
to  handicap  them  from  the  start  by  letting 
them  see  other  children  enjoying  pleasures 
and  advantages  they  can't  afford.  And 
now,  girls,  let's  stop  wasting  time.  It's 
half-past  eleven.  Why  can't  we  have  a 
game  of  auction  right  here  and  now?" 

Margaret  returned  to  her  cheque-book 
with  speed.  The  other  two,  glad  to  be 
aroused,  heartily  approved  the  idea. 

"Well,  what  does  this  very  businesslike 
aspect  imply?"  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  asked  her 
secretary. 

"It  means  that  I  can't  play  cards,  and 
you  oughtn't,"  Margaret  said,  laughing. 

"Oh?    Why  not?" 

"  Because  you've  lots  of  things  to  do,  and 
I've  got  to  finish  these  notes,  and  I  have  to  sit 
with  Harriet  while  she  does  her  German " 

"  Where's  Fraulein?" 

"Fraulein's  going  to  drive  Vic  over  to 


122  MOTHER 

the  Partridges'  for  luncheon,  and  I  promised 
Swann  I'd  talk  to  him  about  favors  and 
things  for  to-morrow  night/' 

"Well — busy  Lizzie!  And  what  have  I 
to  do?" 

Margaret  reached  for  a  well-filled  date- 
book. 

"You  were  to  decide  about  those  altera 
tions,  the  porch  and  dining-room,  you 
know,"  said  she.  "There  are  some  archi 
tect's  sketches  around  here;  the  man's  going 
to  be  here  early  in  the  morning.  You  said 
you'd  drive  to  the  yacht  club,  to  see  about 
the  stage  for  the  children's  play;  you  were 
to  stop  on  the  way  back  and  see  old  Mrs. 
McNab  a  moment.  You  wanted  to  write 
Mrs.  Polk  a  note  to  catch  the  Kaiserin 
Augusta,  and  luncheon's  early  because  of 
the  Kellogg  bridge."  She  shut  the  book. 
"And  call  Mr.  Carr-Boldt  at  the  club  at 
one,"  she  added. 

"All  that,  now  fancy!"  said  her  employer, 
admiringly. 


MOTHER  123 

She  had  swept  some  scattered  magazines 
from  a  small  table,  and  was  now  seated 
there,  negligently  shuffling  a  pack  of  cards 
in  her  fine  white  hands. 

"Ring,  will  you,  Peggy?"  said  she. 

"And  the  boat  races  are  to-day,  and  you 
dine  at  Oaks-in-the-Field,"  Margaret  sup 
plemented  inflexibly. 

"Yes?  Well,  come  and  beat  the  seven 
of  clubs,"  said  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt,  spreading 
the  deck  for  the  draw. 

"Fraulein,"  she  said  sweetly,  a  moment 
later,  when  a  maid  had  summoned  that 
worthy  and  earnest  governess,  "tell  Miss 
Harriet  that  Mother  doesn't  want  her  to  do 
her  German  to-day,  it's  too  warm.  Tell 
her  that  she's  to  go  with  you  and  Miss 
Victoria  for  a  drive.  Thank  you.  And, 
Fraulein,  will  you  telephone  old  Mrs.  Me- 
Nab,  and  say  that  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  is  lying 
down  with  a  severe  headache,  and  she  won't 
be  able  to  come  in  this  morning?  Thank 
you.  And,  Fraulein,  telephone  the  yacht 


I24  MOTHER 

club,  will  you  ?  And  tell  Mr.  Mathews  that 
Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  is  indisposed  and  he'll 
have  to  come  back  this  afternoon.  I'll  talk 
to  him  before  the  children's  races.  And — 
one  thing  more !  Will  you  tell  Swann  Miss 
Paget  will  see  him  about  to-morrow's  dinner 
when  she  comes  back  from  the  yacht  club 
to-day?  And  tell  him  to  send  us  something 
cool  to  drink  now.  Thank  you  so  much. 
No,  shut  it.  Thank  you.  Have  a  nice 
drive!" 

They  all  drew  up  their  chairs  to  the 
table. 

"You  and  I,  Rose,"  said  Mrs.  Watson. 
"I'm  so  glad  you  suggested  this,  Hattie. 
I  am  dying  to  play." 

"It  really  rests  me  more  than  anything 
else,"  said  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt.  "Two  spades." 


CHAPTER  VI 

A"  CHERTON,  a  blur  of  flying  trees 
and  houses,  bright  in  the  late  sun 
light,  Pottsville,  with  children  wad 
ing  and  shouting,  under  the  bridge,  Hunt's 
Crossing,  then  the  next  would  be  Weston 
and  home. 

Margaret,  beginning  to  gather  wraps  and 
small  possessions  together,  sighed.  She 
sighed  partly  because  her  head  ached,  partly 
because  the  hot  trip  had  mussed  her  usual 
fresh  trimness,  largely  because  she  was 
going  home. 

This  was  August ;  her  last  trip  home  had 
been  between  Christmas  and  the  New  Year. 
She  had  sent  a  box  from  Germany  at  Easter, 
ties  for  the  boys,  silk  scarves  for  Rebecca, 
books  for  Dad ;  and  she  had  written  Mother 
for  her  birthday  in  June,  and  enclosed  an 
125 


126  MOTHER 

exquisite  bit  of  lace  in  the  letter;  but  al 
though  Victoria's  illness  had  brought  her  to 
America  nearly  three  months  ago,  it  had 
somehow  been  impossible,  she  wrote  them, 
to  come  home  until  now.  Margaret  had 
paid  a  great  deal  for  the  lace,  as  a  sort  of 
salve  for  her  conscience — not  that  Mother 
would  ever  wear  it ! 

Here  was  Weston.  Weston  looking  its 
very  ugliest  in  the  level  pitiless  rays  of  the 
afternoon  sun.  The  town,  like  most  of  its 
inhabitants,  was  wilted  and  grimed  after 
the  burden  and  heat  of  the  long  summer  day. 
Margaret  carried  her  heavy  suitcase  slowly 
up  Main  Street.  Shop  windows  were  spot 
ted  and  dusty,  and  shopkeepers,  standing 
idle  in  their  doorways,  looked  spotted  and 
dusty,  too.  A  cloud  of  flies  fought  and 
surged  about  the  closely  guarded  door  of  the 
butcher  shop;  a  delivery  cart  was  at  the 
curb,  the  discouraged  horse  switching  an 
ineffectual  tail. 

As  Margaret  passed  this  cart,  a  tall  boy  of 


MOTHER  127 

fourteen  came  out  of  the  shop  with  a  bang 
of  the  wire-netting  door,  and  slid  a  basket 
into  the  back  of  the  cart. 

" Teddy!"  said  Margaret,  irritation  evi 
dent  in  her  voice  in  spite  of  herself. 

"Hello,  Mark!"  said  her  brother,  de 
lightedly.  "Say,  great  to  see  you!  Get 
in  on  the  four-ten?" 

"Ted,"  said  Margaret,  kissing  him,  as  the 
Pagets  always  quite  simply  kissed  each 
other  when  they  met,  "what  are  you  driving 
Costello's  cart  for?" 

"Like  to,"  said  Theodore,  simply. 
"Mother  doesn't  care.  Say,  you  look  swell, 
Mark!" 

"What  makes  you  want  to  drive  this 
horrid  cart,  Ted?"  protested  Margaret. 
"What  does  Costello  pay  you?" 

"Pay  me?"  scowled  her  brother,  gather 
ing  up  the  reins.  "Oh,  come  out  of  it, 
Marg'ret!  He  doesn't  pay  me  anything. 
Don't  you  make  Mother  stop  me,  either, 
will  you  ?"  he  ended  anxiously. 


128  MOTHER 

"Of  course  I  won't!"  Margaret  said  im 
patiently. 

"Giddap,  Ruth!"  said  Theodore;  but 
departing,  he  pulled  up  to  add  cheerfully, 
"Say,  Dad  didn't  get  his  raise." 

"Did?"  said  Margaret,  brightening. 

"Didn't!"  He  grinned  affectionately 
upon  her  as  with  a  dislocating  jerk  the 
cart  started  a  ricochetting  career  down  the 
street  with  that  abandon  known  only  to 
butchers'  carts.  Margaret,  changing  her 
heavy  suitcase  to  the  rested  arm,  was  still 
vexedly  watching  it,  when  two  girls,  laugh 
ing  in  the  open  doorway  of  the  express 
company's  office  across  the  street,  caught 
sight  of  her.  One  of  them,  a  little  vision  of 
pink  hat  and  ruffles,  and  dark  eyes  and  hair, 
came  running  to  join  her. 

Rebecca  was  now  sixteen,  and  of  all  the 
handsome  Pagets  the  best  to  look  upon. 
She  was  dressed  according  to  her  youthful 
lights;  every  separate  article  of  her  apparel 
to-day,  from  her  rowdyish  little  hat  to  her 


MOTHER  129 

openwork  hose,  represented  a  battle  with 
Mrs.  Paget's  preconceived  ideas  as  to  pro 
priety  in  dress,  with  the  honors  largely  for 
Rebecca.  Rebecca  had  grown  up,  in  eight 
months,  her  sister  thought,  confusedly; 
she  was  no  longer  the  adorable,  un-self- 
conscious  tomboy  who  fought  and  skated 
and  toboganned  with  the  boys. 

"Hello,  darling  dear!"  said  Rebecca. 
"Too  bad  no  one  met  you!  We  all  thought 
you  were  coming  on  the  six.  Crazy  about 
your  suit !  Here's  Maudie  Pratt.  You  know 
Maudie,  don't  you,  Mark?" 

Margaret  knew  Maudie.  Rebecca's  in 
fatuation  for  plain,  heavy-featured,  com 
placent  Miss  Pratt  was  a  standing  mystery 
in  the  Paget  family.  Margaret  smiled, 
bowed. 

"I  think  we  stumbled  upon  a  pretty  little 
secret  of  yours  to-day,  Miss  Margaret," 
said  Maudie,  with  her  best  company  man 
ner,  as  they  walked  along.  Margaret  raised 
her  eyebrows.  "Rebel  and  I,"  Maudie 


i3o  MOTHER 

went  on — Rebecca  was  at  the  age  that  seeks 
a  piquant  substitute  for  an  unpoetical  family 
name — "Rebel  and  I  are  wondering  if  we 
may  ask  you  who  Mr.  John  Tenison  is?" 

John  Tenison!  Margaret's  heart  stood 
still  with  a  shock  almost  sickening,  then 
beat  furiously.  What — how — who  on  earth 
had  told  them  anything  of  John  Tenison  ? 
Coloring  high,  she  looked  sharply  at  Re 
becca. 

"Cheer  up,  angel,"  said  Rebecca,  "he's 
not  dead.  He  sent  a  telegram  to-day,  and 
Mother  opened  it " 

"Naturally,"  said  Margaret,  concealing 
an  agony  of  impatience,  as  Rebecca  paused 
apologetically. 

"He's  with  his  aunt,  at  Dayton,  up  the 
road  here,"  continued  Rebecca ;  "  and  wants 
you  to  wire  him  if  he  may  come  down  and 
spend  to-morrow  here." 

Margaret  drew  a  relieved  breath.  There 
was  time  to  turn  around,  at  least. 

"Who  is  he,  sis?"  asked  Rebecca. 


MOTHER  131 

"Why,  he's  an  awfully  clever  professor, 
honey,"  Margaret  answered  serenely.  "We 
heard  him  lecture  in  Germany  this  spring, 
and  met  him  afterward.  I  liked  him  very 
much.  He's  tremendously  interesting."  She 
tried  to  keep  out  of  her  voice  the  thrill 
that  shook  her  at  the  mere  thought  of  him. 
Confused  pain  and  pleasure  stirred  her  to 
the  very  heart.  He  wanted  to  come  to  see 
her,  he  must  have  telephoned  Mrs.  Carr- 
Boldt  and  asked  to  call,  or  he  would  not  have 
known  that  she  was  at  home  this  week-end 
— surely  that  was  significant,  surely  that 
meant  something!  The  thought  was  all 
pleasure,  so  great  a  joy  and  pride  indeed 
that  Margaret  was  conscious  of  wanting  to 
lay  it  aside,  to  think  of,  dream  of,  ponder 
over,  when  she  was  alone.  But,  on  the 
other  hand,  there  was  instantly  the  miser 
able  conviction  that  he  mustn't  be  allowed 
to  come  to  Weston,  no — no — she  couldn't 
have  him  see  her  home  and  her  people  on  a 
crowded  hot  summer  Sunday,  when  the 


i32  MOTHER 

town  looked  its  ugliest,  and  the  children 
were  home  from  school,  and  when  the 
scramble  to  get  to  church  and  to  safely 
accomplish  the  one  o'clock  dinner  exhausted 
the  women  of  the  family.  And  how  could 
she  keep  him  from  coming,  what  excuse 
could  she  give? 

"  Don't  you  want  him  to  come — is  he  old 
and  fussy?"  asked  Rebecca,  interestedly. 

"I'll  see,"  Margaret  answered  vaguely. 
"No,  he's  only  thirty-two  or  four." 

"And  charming!"  said  Maudie  archly. 
Margaret  eyed  her  with  a  coolness  worthy 
of  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt  herself,  and  then  turned 
rather  pointedly  to  Rebecca. 

"How's  Mother,  Becky?" 

"Oh,  she's  fine!"  Rebecca  said,  absently 
in  her  turn.  When  Maudie  left  them  at 
the  next  corner,  she  said  quickly: 

"Mark,  did  you  see  where  we  were  when 
I  saw  you?" 

"At  the  express  office ?  Yes,"  Mar 
garet  said,  surprised. 


MOTHER  133 

"Well,  listen,"  said  Rebecca,  reddening. 
"Don't  say  anything  to  Mother  about  it, 
will  you?  She  thinks  those  boys  are  fresh 
in  there — she  don't  like  me  to  go  in!" 

"Oh,  Beck — then  you  oughtn't!"  Mar 
garet  protested. 

"Well,  I  wasn't !"  Rebecca  said  uncomfort 
ably.  "We  went  to  see  if  Maudie's  racket 
had  come.  You  won't — will  you,  Mark?" 

"Tell  Mother— no,  I  won't,"  Margaret 
said,  with  a  long  sigh.  She  looked  sideways 
at  Rebecca — the  dainty,  fast-forming  little 
figure,  the  even  ripple  and  curl  of  her  plaited 
hair,  the  assured  pose  of  the  pretty  head. 
Victoria  Carr-Boldt,  just  Rebecca's  age,  was 
a  big  schoolgirl  still,  self-conscious  and 
inarticulate,  her  well-groomed  hair  in  an 
unbecoming  "club,"  her  well-hung  skirts 
unbecomingly  short.  Margaret  had  half 
expected  to  find  Rebecca  at  the  same  stage 
of  development. 

Rebecca  was  cheerful  now,  the  promise 
exacted,  and  cheerfully  observed: 


134  MOTHER 

"Dad  didn't  get  his  raise — isn't  that  the 
limit?" 

Margaret  sighed  again,  shrugged  wearily. 
They  were  in  their  own  quiet  side  street 
now,  a  street  lined  with  ugly,  shabby  houses 
and  beautified  by  magnificent  old  elms  and 
maples.  The  Pagets'  own  particular  gate 
was  weather-peeled,  the  lawn  trampled  and 
bare.  A  bulging  wire-netting  door  gave  on 
the  shabby  old  hall  Margaret  knew  so  well ; 
she  went  on  into  the  familiar  rooms,  acutely 
conscious,  as  she  always  was  for  the  first 
hour  or  two  at  home,  of  the  bareness  and 
ugliness  everywhere — the  old  sofa  that 
sagged  in  the  seat,  the  scratched  rockers,  the 
bookcases  overflowing  with  coverless  maga 
zines,  and  the  old  square  piano  half-buried 
under  loose  sheets  of  music. 

Duncan  sat  on  the  piano  bench — gloom 
ily  sawing  at  a  violoncello.  Robert — nine 
now,  with  all  his  pretty  baby  roundness 
gone,  a  lean  little  burned,  peeling  face,  and 
big  teeth  missing  when  he  smiled,  stood  in 


Tj 
'Eb 


MOTHER  135 

the  bay  window,  twisting  the  already  limp 
net  curtains  into  a  tight  rope.  Each  boy 
gave  Margaret  a  kiss  that  seemed  curiously 
to  taste  of  dust,  sunburn,  and  freckles, 
before  she  followed  a  noise  of  hissing  and 
voices  to  the  kitchen  to  find  Mother. 

The  kitchen,  at  five  o'clock  on  Saturday 
afternoon,  was  in  wild  confusion,  and  insuf 
ferably  hot.  Margaret  had  a  distinct  im 
pression  that  not  a  movable  article  therein 
was  in  place,  and  not  an  available  inch  of 
tables  or  chairs  unused,  before  her  eyes 
reached  the  tall  figure  of  the  woman  in  a 
gown  of  chocolate  percale,  who  was  frying 
cutlets  at  the  big  littered  range.  Her  face 
was  dark  with  heat  and  streaked  with 
perspiration.  She  turned  as  Margaret  en 
tered,  and  gave  a  delighted  cry. 

"Well,  there's  my  girl!  Bless  her  heart! 
Look  out  for  this  spoon,  lovey,"  she  added 
immediately,  giving  the  girl  a  guarded  em 
brace.  Tears  of  joy  stood  frankly  in  her 
fine  eyes. 


136  MOTHER 

"I  meant  to  have  all  of  this  out  of  the 
way,  dear/'  apologized  Mrs.  Paget,  with 
a  gesture  that  included  cakes  in  the  process 
of  frosting,  salad  vegetables  in  the  process 
of  cooling,  soup  in  the  process  of  getting 
strained,  great  loaves  of  bread  that  sent  a 
delicious  fragrance  over  all  the  other  odors. 
"  But  we  didn't  look  for  you  until  six." 

"Oh,  no  matter!"  Margaret  said  bravely. 

"Rebecca  tell  you  Dad  didn't  get  his 
raise?"  called  Mrs.  Paget,  in  a  voice  that 
rose  above  the  various  noises  of  the  kitchen. 
"Blanche!"  she  protested,  "can't  that 
wait?"  for  the  old  negress  had  begun  to 
crack  ice  with  deafening  smashes.  But 
Blanche  did  not  hear,  so  Mrs.  Paget  contin 
ued  loudly:  "Dad  saw  Redman  himself; 
he'll  tell  you  about  it!  Don't  stay  in  the 
kitchen  in  that  pretty  dress,  dear!  I'm 
coming  right  upstairs." 

It  was  very  hot  upstairs;  the  bedrooms 
smelled  faintly  of  matting,  the  soap  in  the 
bathroom  was  shrivelled  in  its  saucer.  In 


MOTHER  137 

Margaret's  old  room  the  week's  washing 
had  been  piled  high  on  the  bed.  She  took 
off  her  hat  and  linen  coat,  brushed  her  hair 
back  from  her  face,  flinging  her  head  back 
and  shutting  her  eyes  the  better  to  fight 
tears  as  she  did  so,  and  began  to  assort  the 
collars  and  shirts  and  put  them  away.  For 
Dad's  bureau — for  Bruce's  bureau — for  the 
boys'  bureau,  tablecloths  to  go  downstairs, 
towels  for  the  shelves  in  the  bathroom. 
Two  little  shirtwaists  for  Rebecca  with 
little  holes  torn  through  them  where  collar 
and  belt  pins  belonged. 

Her  last  journey  took  her  to  the  big, 
third-story  room  where  the  three  younger 
boys  slept.  The  three  narrow  beds  were 
still  unmade,  and  the  western  sunlight 
poured  over  tumbled  blankets  and  the 
scattered  small  possessions  that  seem  to 
ooze  from  the  pores  of  little  boys.  Mar 
garet  set  her  lips  distastefully  as  she  brought 
order  out  of  chaos.  It  was  all  wrong,  some 
how,  she  thought,  gathering  handkerchiefs 


138  MOTHER 

and  matches  and  "Nick  Carters"  and  the 
oiled  paper  that  had  wrapped  caramels 
from  under  the  pillows  that  would  in  a  few 
hours  harbor  a  fresh  supply. 

She  went  out  on  the  porch  in  time  to  put 
her  arms  about  her  father's  shabby  shoul 
ders  when  he  came  in.  Mr.  Paget  was  tired, 
and  he  told  his  wife  and  daughters  that  he 
thought  he  was  a  very  sick  man.  Mar 
garet's  mother  met  this  statement  with  an 
anxious  solicitude  that  was  very  soothing 
to  the  sufferer.  She  made  Mark  get  Daddy 
his  slippers  and  loose  coat,  and  suggested 
that  Rebecca  shake  up  the  dining-room 
couch  before  she  established  him  there,  in 
a  rampart  of  pillows.  No  outsider  would 
have  dreamed  that  Mrs.  Paget  had  dealt 
with  this  exact  emergency  some  hundreds  of 
times  in  the  past  twenty  years. 

Mr.  Paget,  reclining,  shut  his  eyes,  re 
marked  that  he  had  had  an  "awful,  awful 
day,"  and  wondered  faintly  if  it  would  be 
too  much  trouble  to  have  "somebody" 


MOTHER  139 

make  him  just  a  little  milk  toast  for  his 
dinner.  He  smiled  at  Margaret  when  she 
sat  down  beside  him;  all  the  children  were 
dear,  but  the  oldest  daughter  knew  she 
came  first  with  her  father. 

"Getting  to  be  an  old,  old  man!"  he  said 
wearily,  and  Margaret  hated  herself  be 
cause  she  had  to  quell  an  impatient  impulse 
to  tell  him  he  was  merely  tired  and  cross- 
and  hungry,  before  she  could  say,  in  the 
proper  soothing  tone,  "Don't  talk  that  way, 
Dad  darling!"  She  had  to  listen  to  a  long; 
account  of  the  "raise,"  wincing  every  time 
her  father  emphasized  the  difference  be 
tween  her  own  position  and  that  of  her 
employer.  Dad  was  at  least  the  equal  of 
any  one  in  Weston !  Why,  a  man  Dad's  age 
oughtn't  to  be  humbly  asking  a  raise,  he 
ought  to  be  dictating  now.  It  was  just 
Dad's  way  of  looking  at  things,  and  it  was 
all  wrong. 

"Well,  I'll  tell  you  one  thing!"  said 
Rebecca,  who  had  come  in  with  a  brimming 


140  MOTHER 

soup  plate  of  milk  toast,  "Joe  Redman  gave 
a  picnic  last  month,  and  he  came  here  with 
his  mother,  in  the  car,  to  ask  me.  And  I 
was  the  scornfullest  thing  you  ever  saw, 
wasn't  I,  Ted?  Not  much!" 

"Oh,  Beck,  you  oughtn't  to  mix  social 
and  business  things  that  way!"  Margaret 
said  helplessly. 

"Dinner!"  screamed  the  nine-year-old 
Robert,  breaking  into  the  room  at  this 
point,  and  "Dinner!"  said  Mrs.  Paget, 
wearily,  cheerfully,  from  the  chair  into 
which  she  had  dropped  at  the  head  of  the 
table.  Mr.  Paget,  revived  by  sympathy, 
milk  toast,  and  Rebecca's  attentions,  took 
his  place  at  the  foot,  and  Bruce  the  chair 
between  Margaret  and  his  mother.  Like 
the  younger  boys,  whose  almost  confluent 
freckles  had  been  brought  into  unusual  prom 
inence  by  violently  applied  soap  and  water, 
and  whose  hair  dripped  on  their  collars,  he 
had  brushed  up  for  dinner,  but  his  negligee 
shirt  and  corduroy  trousers  were  stained  and 


MOTHER  141 

spotted  from  machine  oil.  Margaret,  com 
paring  him  secretly  to  the  men  she  knew,  as 
daintily  groomed  as  women,  in  their  spotless 
white,  felt  a  little  resentment  that  Bruce's 
tired  face  was  so  contented,  and  said  to  her 
self  again  that  it  was  all  wrong. 

Dinner  was  the  same  old  haphazard  meal 
with  which  she  was  so  familiar;  Blanche 
supplying  an  occasional  reproof  to  the  boys, 
Ted  ignoring  his  vegetables,  and  ready  in 
an  incredibly  short  time  for  a  second  cutlet, 
and  Robert  begging  for  corn  syrup,  im 
mediately  after  the  soup,  and  spilling  it 
from  his  bread.  Mrs.  Paget  was  flushed, 
her  disappearances  kitchenward  frequent. 
She  wanted  Margaret  to  tell  her  all  about 
Mr.  Tenison.  Margaret  laughed,  and  said 
there  was  nothing  to  tell. 

"You  might  get  a  horse  and  buggy  from 
Peterson's,"  suggested  Mrs.  Paget,  inter 
estedly,  "and  drive  about  after  dinner." 

"Oh,  Mother,  I  don't  think  I  had  better 
let  him  come!"  Margaret  said.  "There's 


i42  MOTHER 

so   many  of  us,   and   such   confusion,   on 
Sunday!    Ju  and  Harry  are  almost  sure  to 


come  over/' 


"Yes,  I  guess  they  will,"  Mrs.  Paget  said, 
with  her  sudden  radiant  smile.  "Ju  is  so 
dear  in  her  little  house,  and  Harry's  so  sweet 
with  her,"  she  went  on  with  vivacity. 
"  Daddy  and  I  had  dinner  with  them  Tues 
day.  Bruce  said  Rebecca  was  lovely  with 
the  boys — we're  going  to  Julie's  again 
•some  time.  I  declare  it's  so  long  since  we've 
been  anywhere  without  the  children  that 
we  both  felt  funny.  It  was  a  lovely  eve 
ning." 

"You're  too  much  tied,  Mother,"  Mar 
garet  said  affectionately. 

"Not  now!"  her  mother  protested  radi 
antly.  "With  all  my  babies  turning  into 
men  and  women  so  fast.  And  I'll  have  you 
all  together  to-morrow — and  your  friend 
I  hope,  too,  Mark,"  she  added  hospitably. 
"You  had  better  let  him  come,  dear. 
There's  a  big  dinner,  and  I  always  freeze 


MOTHER 

more  cream  than  we  need,  anyway,  because 
Daddy  likes  a  plate  of  it  about  four  o'clock, 
if  there's  any  left." 

"Well — but  there's  nothing  to  do,"  Mar 
garet  protested. 

"No,  but  dinner  takes  quite  a  while," 
Mrs.  Paget  suggested  a  little  doubtfully; 
"and  we  could  have  a  nice  talk  on  the  porch, 
and  then  you  could  go  driving  or  walking. 
I  wish  there  was  something  cool  and  pleasant 
to  do,  Mark,"  she  finished  a  little  wistfully. 
"  You  do  just  as  you  think  best  about  asking 
him  to  come." 

"I  think  I'll  wire  him  that  another  time 
would  be  better,"  said  Margaret,  slowly. 
"Some  time  we'll  regularly  arrange  for  it." 

"Well,  perhaps  that  would  be  best,"  her 
mother  agreed.  "Some  other  time  we'll 
send  the  boys  off  before  dinner,  and  have 
things  all  nice  and  quiet.  In  October,  say, 
when  the  trees  are  so  pretty.  I  don't  know 
but  what  that's  my  favorite  time  of  all  the 
year!" 


144  MOTHER 

Margaret  looked  at  her  as  if  she  found 
something  new  in  the  tired,  bright  face. 
She  could  not  understand  why  her  mother — 
still  too  heated  to  commence  eating  her 
dinner — should  radiate  so  definite  in  atmos 
phere  of  content,  as  she  sat  back  a  little 
breathless,  after  the  flurry  of  serving.  She 
herself  felt  injured  and  sore,  not  at  the  mere 
disappointment  it  caused  her  to  put  off 
John  Tenison's  visit,  but  because  she  felt 
more  acutely  than  ever  to-night  the  differ 
ence  between  his  position  and  her  own. 

"Something  nice  has  happened,  Mother?" 
she  hazarded,  entering  with  an  effort  into 
the  older  woman's  mood. 

"Nothing  special."  Her  mother's  happy 
eyes  ranged  about  the  circle  of  young  faces. 
"But  it's  so  lovely  to  have  you  here,  and 
to  have  Ju  coming  to-morrow,"  she  said. 
"I  just  wish  Daddy  could  build  a  house  for 
each  one  of  you,  as  you  marry  and  settle 
down,  right  around  our  house  in  a  circle, 
as  they  say  people  do  sometimes  in  the  Old 


MOTHER  145 

World.  I  think  then  I'd  have  nothing  in 
life  to  wish  for!" 

"Oh,  Mother— in  Weston!"  Margaret 
said  hopelessly,  but  her  mother  did  not 
catch  it. 

"Not,  Mark,"  she  went  on  hastily  and 
earnestly,  "that  I'm  not  more  than  grateful 
to  God  for  all  His  goodness,  as  it  is !  I  look 
at  other  women,  and  I  wonder,  I  wonder — 
what  I  have  done  to  be  so  blessed!  Mark 
— "  her  face  suddenly  glowed,  she  leaned  a 
little  toward  her  daughter,  "dearie,  I  must 
tell  you,"  she  said;  "it's  about  Ju " 

Their  eyes  met  in  the  pause. 

"Mother — really?"  Margaret  said  slowly. 

"She  told  me  on  Tuesday,"  Mrs.  Paget 
said,  with  glistening  eyes.  "Now,  not  a 
word  to  any  one,  Mark — but  shell  want 
you  to  know!" 

"And  is  she  glad?"  Margaret  said,  unable 
to  rejoice. 

"Glad?"  Mrs.  Paget  echoed,  her  face 
gladness  itself. 


146  MOTHER 

"Well,  Ju's  so  young — just  twenty-one," 
Margaret  submitted  a  little  uncertainly; 
"and  she's  been  so  free — and  they're  just 
in  the  new  house !  And  I  thought  they  were 
going  to  Europe!" 

"Oh,  Europe!"  Mrs.  Paget  dismissed  it 
cheerfully.  "Why,  it's  the  happiest  time 
in  a  woman's  life,  Mark!  Or  I  don't  know, 
though,"  she  went  on  thoughtfully,  "I 
don't  know  but  what  I  was  happiest  when 
you  were  all  tiny,  tumbling  about  me,  and 
climbing  into  my  lap.  .  .  .  Why,  you 
love  children,  dear,"  she  finished,  with  a 
shade  of  reproach  in  her  voice,  as  Mar 
garet  still  looked  sober. 

"Yes,  I  know,  Mother,"  Margaret  said. 
"  But  Julie's  only  got  the  one  maid,  and  I 
don't  suppose  they  can  have  another.  I 
hope  to  goodness  Ju  won't  get  herself  all 
run  down!" 

Her  mother  laughed.  "You  remind  me 
of  Grandma  Paget,"  said  she,  cheerfully; 
"she  lived  ten  miles  away  when  we  were 


MOTHER  147 

married,  but  she  came  in  when  Bruce  was 
born.  She  was  rather  a  proud,  cold  woman 
herself,  but  she  was  very  sweet  to  me. 
Well,  then  little  Charlie  came,  fourteen 
months  later,  and  she  took  that  very  seri 
ously.  Mother  was  dead,  you  know,  and 
she  stayed  with  me  again,  and  worried  me 
half  sick  telling  me  that  it  wasn't  fair  to 
Bruce  and  it  wasn't  fair  to  Charlie  to  divide 
my  time  between  them  that  way.  Well, 
then  when  my  third  baby  was  coming,  I 
didn't  dare  tell  her.  Dad  kept  telling  me 
to,  and  I  couldn't,  because  I  knew  what  a 
calamity  a  third  would  seem  to  her !  Finally 
she  went  to  visit  Aunt  Rebecca  out  West, 
and  it  was  the  very  day  she  got  back  that 
the  baby'  came.  She  came  upstairs — she'd 
come  right  up  from  the  train,  and  not  seen 
any  one  but  Dad ;  and  he  wasn't  very  intel 
ligible,  I  guess — and  she  sat  down  and  took 
the  baby  in  her  arms,  and  says  she,  looking 
at  me  sort  of  patiently,  yet  as  if  she  was  ex 
asperated,  too:  'Well,  this  is  a  nice  way  to 


148  MOTHER 

do,  the  minute  my  back's  turned!  What 
are  you  going  to  call  him,  Julia?"  And  I 
said,  'I'm  going  to  call  her  Margaret,  for 
my  dear  husband's  mother,  and  she's  going 
to  be  beautiful  and  good,  and  grow  up  to 
marry  the  President !' '  Mrs.  Paget's  merry 
laugh  rang  out.  "I  never  shall  forget  your 
grandmother's  face. 

"Just  the  same,"  Mrs.  Paget  added,  with 
a  sudden  deep  sigh,  "when  little  Charlie 
left  us,  the  next  year,  and  Brucie  and  Dad 
were  both  so  ill,  she  and  I  agreed  that  you 
— you  were  just  talking  and  trying  to  walk 
— were  the  only  comfort  we  had!  I  could 
wish  my  girls  no  greater  happiness  than  my 
children  have  been  to  me,"  finished  Mother, 
contentedly. 

"I  know,"  Margaret  began,  half  angrily; 
"but  what  about  the  children?"  she  was 
going  to  add.  But  somehow  the  arguments 
she  had  used  so  plausibly  did  not  utter  them 
selves  easily  to  Mother,  whose  children 
would  carry  into  their  own  middle  age  a 


MOTHER  149 

wholesome  dread  of  her  anger.  Margaret 
faltered,  and  merely  scowled. 

"I  don't  like  to  see  that  expression  on 
your  face,  dearie/'  her  mother  said,  as  she 
might  have  said  it  to  an  eight-year-old 
child.  "  Be  my  sweet  girl !  Why,  marriage 
isn't  marriage  without  children,  Mark. 
I've  been  thinking  all  week  of  having  a 
baby  in  my  arms  again — it's  so  long  since 
Rob  was  a  baby." 

Margaret  devoted  herself,  with  a  rather 
sullen  face,  to  her  dessert.  Mother  would 
never  feel  as  she  did  about  these  things,  and 
what  was  the  use  of  arguing?  In  the  silence 
she  heard  her  father  speak  loudly  and  sud 
denly. 

"I  am  not  in  a  position  to  have  my 
children  squander  money  on  concerts  and 
candy,"  he  said.  Margaret  forgot  her  own 
grievance,  and  looked  up.  The  boys  looked 
resentful  and  gloomy;  Rebecca  was  flushed, 
her  eyes  dropped,  her  lips  trembling  with 
disappointment. 


I5o  MOTHER 

"  I  had  promised  to  take  them  to  the  Elks' 
Concert  and  dance/'  Mrs.  Paget  inter 
preted  hastily.  "But  now  Dad  says  the 
Bakers  are  coming  over  to  play  whist." 

"Is  it  going  to  be  a  good  show,  Ted?" 
Margaret  asked. 

"Oh,"  Rebecca  flashed  into  instant  glow 
ing  response.  "It's  going  to  be  a  dandy! 
Every  one's  going  to  be  there!  Ford  Pat 
terson  is  going  to  do  a  monologue — he's  as 
good  as  a  professional ! — and  George  is  going 
to  send  up  a  bunch  of  carrots  and  parsnips! 
And  the  Weston  Male  Quartette,  Mark,  and 
a  playlet  by  the  Hunt's  Crossing  Amateur 
Theatrical  Society!" 

"Oh — oh!" — Margaret  mimicked  the 
eager  rush  of  words.  "Let  me  take  them, 
Dad,"  she  pleaded,  "if  it's  going  to  be  as 
fine  as  all  that!  I'll  stand  treat  for  the 
crowd." 

"Oh,  Mark,  you  darling!"  burst  from  the 
rapturous  Rebecca. 

"Say,  gee,  we've  got  to  get  there  early!" 


MOTHER  151 

Theodore  warned  them,  finishing  his  pud 
ding  with  one  mammoth  spoonful. 

"If  you  take  them,  my  dear,"  Mr.  Paget 
said  graciously,  "of  course  Mother  and  I  are 
quite  satisfied/' 

"I'll  hold  Robert  by  one  ear  and  Rebecca 
by  another,"  Margaret  promised;  "and  if 
she  so  much  as  dares  to  look  at  George  or 
Ted  or  Jimmy  Barr  or  Paul,  I'll " 

"Oh,  Jimmy  belongs  to  Louise,  now," 
said  Rebecca,  radiantly.  There  was  a  joy 
ous  shout  of  laughter  from  the  light-hearted 
juniors,  and  Rebecca,  seeing  her  artless  ad 
mission  too  late,  turned  scarlet  while  she 
laughed.  Dinner  broke  up  in  confusion,  as 
dinner  at  home  always  did,  and  everybody 
straggled  upstairs  to  dress. 

Margaret,  changing  her  dress  in  a  room 
that  was  insufferably  hot,  because  the 
shades  must  be  down,  and  the  gas-lights  as 
high  as  possible,  reflected  that  another 
forty-eight  hours  would  see  her  speeding 
back  to  the  world  of  cool,  awninged  interiors, 


iS2  MOTHER 

uniformed  maids,  the  clink  of  iced  glasses, 
the  flash  of  white  sails  on  blue  water.  She 
could  surely  afford  for  that  time  to  be 
patient  and  sweet.  She  lifted  Rebecca's 
starched  petticoat  from  the  bed  to  give 
Mother  a  seat,  when  Mother  came  rather 
wearily  in  to  watch  them. 

"Sweet  girl  to  take  them,  Mark,"  said 
Mother,  appreciatively.  "I  was  going  to 
ask  Brucie.  But  he's  gone  to  bed,  poor 
fellow;  he's  worn  out  to-night." 

"He  had  a  letter  from  Ned  Gunther  this 
morning,"  said  Rebecca,  cheerfully — pow 
dering  the  tip  of  her  pretty  nose,  her  eyes  al 
most  crossed  with  concentration — "and  I 
think  it  made  him  blue  all  day." 

"Ned  Gunther?"  said  Margaret. 

"Chum  at  college/'  Rebecca  elucidated; 
"a  lot  of  them  are  going  to  Honolulu,  just 
for  this  month,  and  of  course  they  wanted 
Bruce.  Mark,  does  that  show?" 

Margaret's  heart  ached  for  the  beloved 
brother's  disappointment.  There  it  was 


MOTHER  153 

again,  all  wrong!  Before  she  left  the  house 
with  the  rioting  youngsters,  she  ran  up 
stairs  to  his  room.  Bruce,  surrounded  by 
scientific  magazines,  a  drop-light  with  a 
vivid  green  shade  over  his  shoulder,  looked 
up  with  a  welcoming  smile. 

"Sit  down  and  talk,  Mark,"  said  he. 

Margaret  explained  her  hurry. 

"Bruce — this  isn't  much  fun!"  she  said, 
looking  about  the  room  with  its  shabby 
dresser  and  worn  carpet.  "Why  aren't  you 
going  to  the  concert?" 

"Is  there  a  concert?"  he  asked,  surprised. 

"Why,  didn't  you  hear  us  talking  at 
dinner?  The  Elks,  you  know." 

"Well — sure!  I  meant  to  go  to  that.  I 
forgot  it  was  to-night,"  he  said,  with  his 
lazy  smile.  "I  came  home  all  in,  forgot 
everything." 

"Oh,  come!"  Margaret  urged,  as  eagerly 
as  Rebecca  ever  did.  "It's  early,  Bruce, 
come  on!  You  don't  have  to  shave!  We'll 
hold  a  seat — come  on!" 


154  MOTHER 

"Sure,  I  will!"  he  said,  suddenly  roused. 
The  magazines  rapped  on  the  floor,  and 
Margaret  had  barely  shut  the  door  behind 
her  when  she  heard  his  bare  feet  follow 
them. 

It  was  like  old  times  to  sit  next  to  him 
through  the  hot  merry  evening,  while 
Rebecca  glowed  like  a  little  rose  among  her 
friends,  and  the  smaller  boys  tickled  her  ear 
with  their  whispered  comments.  Margaret 
had  sent  a  telegram  to  Professor  Tenison, 
and  felt  relieved  that  at  least  that  strain  was 
spared  her.  She  even  danced  with  Bruce 
after  the  concert,  and  with  one  or  two  old 
friends. 

Afterward  they  strolled  back  slowly 
through  the  inky  summer  dark,  finding  the 
house  hot  and  close  when  they  came  in. 
Margaret  went  upstairs,  hearing  her  mother's 
apologetic,  "Oh,  Dad,  why  didn't  I  give 
you  back  your  club?"  as  she  passed  the 
dining-room  door.  She  knew  Mother  hated 
whist,  and  wondered  rather  irritably  why 


MOTHER  155 

she  played  it.  The  Paget  family  was  slow 
to  settle  down.  Robert  became  tearful 
and  whining  before  he  was  finally  bumped 
protesting  into  bed.  Theodore  and  Duncan 
prolonged  their  ablutions  until  the  noise  of 
shouting,  splashing,  and  thumping  in  the 
bathroom  brought  Mother  to  the  foot  of  the 
stairs.  Rebecca  was  conversational.  She 
lay  with  her  slender  arms  locked  behind 
her  head  on  the  pillow,  and  talked,  as  Julie 
had  talked  on  that  memorable  night  five 
years  ago.  Margaret,  restless  in  the  hot 
darkness,  wondering  whether  the  madden 
ing  little  shaft  of  light  from  the  hall  gas 
was  annoying  enough  to  warrant  the  effort 
of  getting  up  and  extinguishing  it,  listened 
and  listened. 

Rebecca  wanted  to  join  the  Stage  Club, 
but  Mother  wouldn't  let  her  unless  Bruce 
did.  Rebecca  belonged  to  the  Progressive 
Diners.  Did  Mark  suppose  Mother'd  think 
she  was  crazy  if  she  asked  the  family  not 
to  be  in  evidence  when  the  crowd  came  to 


156  MOTHER 

the  house  for  the  salad  course?  And 
Rebecca  wanted  to  write  to  Bruce's  chum, 
not  regularly,  you  know,  Mark,  but  just 
now  and  then,  he  was  so  nice !  And  Mother 
didn't  like  the  idea.  Margaret  was  ob 
viously  supposed  to  lend  a  hand  with  these 
interesting  tangles. 

".  .  .  and  I  said,  'Certainly  not!  I 
won't  unmask  at  all,  if  it  comes  to  that!' 

.  .  .  And  imagine  that  elegant  fellow 
carrying  my  old  books  and  my  skates !  So 
I  wrote,  and  Maudie  and  I  decided.  .  .  . 
And  Mark,  if  it  wasn't  a  perfectly  gorgeous 
box  of  roses !  .  .  .  That  old,  old  dimity, 
but  Mother  pressed  and  freshened  it  up. 
.  .  .  Not  that  I  want  to  marry  him,  or 
any  one  .  .  ." 

Margaret  wakened  from  uneasy  drowsing 
with  a  start.  The  hall  was  dark  now,  the 
room  cooler.  Rebecca  was  asleep.  Hands, 
hands  she  knew  well,  were  drawing  a  light 
covering  over  her  shoulders.  She  opened 
her  eyes  to  see  her  mother. 


MOTHER  157 

"I've  been  wondering  if  you're  disap 
pointed  about  your  friend  not  coming  to 
morrow,  Mark?5'  said  the  tender  voice. 

"Oh,  no-o!"  said  Margaret,  hardily. 
"Mother — why  are  you  up  so  late ?" 

"Just  going  to  bed,"  said  the  other, 
soothingly.  "Blanche  forgot  to  put  the 
oatmeal  into  the  cooker,  and  I  went  down 
stairs  again.  I'll  say  my  prayers  in  here." 

Margaret  went  off  to  sleep  again,  as  she 
had  so  many  hundred  times  before,  with 
her  mother  kneeling  beside  her. 


CHAPTER  VII 

IT  SEEMED  but  a  few  moments  before 
the   blazing   Sunday  was   precipitated 
upon  them,  and  everybody  was  late  for 
everything. 

The  kitchen  was  filled  with  the  smoke 
from  hot  griddles  blue  in  the  sunshine  when 
Margaret  went  downstairs;  and  in  the 
dining-room  the  same  merciless  light  fell 
upon  the  sticky  syrup  pitcher,  and  upon  the 
stains  on  the  tablecloth.  Cream  had  been 
brought  in  in  the  bottle,  the  bread  tray  was 
heaped  with  orange  skins,  and  the  rolls 
piled  on  the  tablecloth.  Bruce,  who  had 
already  been  to  church  with  Mother  and 
was  off  for  a  day's  sail,  was  dividing  his 
attention  between  Robert  and  his  watch. 
Rebecca,  daintily  busy  with  the  special 
cup  and  plate  that  were  one  of  her  little 

158 


MOTHER  159 

affectations,  was  all  ready  for  the  day,  ex 
cept  as  to  dress,  wearing  a  thin  little  kimono 
over  her  blue  ribbons  and  starched  em 
broideries.  Mother  was  putting  up  a  little 
lunch  for  Bruce.  Confusion  reigned.  The 
younger  boys  were  urged  to  hurry,  if  they 
wanted  to  make  the  "nine."  Rebecca  was 
going  to  wait  for  the  "half-past  ten,"  be 
cause  the  "kids  sang  at  nine,  and  it  was 
fierce."  Mr.  Paget  and  his  sons  departed 
together,  and  the  girls  went  upstairs  for  a 
hot,  tiring  tussle  with  beds  and  dusting 
before  starting  for  church.  They  left  their 
mother  busy  with  the  cream  freezer  in  the 
kitchen.  It  was  very  hot  even  then. 

But  it  was  still  hotter,  walking  home  in 
the  burning  midday  stillness.  A  group  of 
young  people  waited  lazily  for  letters,  under 
the  trees  outside  the  post-office  door.  Other 
wise  the  main  street  was  deserted.  A 
languid  little  breeze  brought  the  far  echoes 
of  pianos  and  phonographs  from  this  di 
rection  and  that. 


160  MOTHER 

"Who's  that  on  the  porch?"  said  Rebecca, 
suddenly,  as  they  neared  home,  instantly 
finding  the  stranger  among  her  father  and 
the  boys.  Margaret,  glancing  up  sharply, 
saw,  almost  with  a  sensation  of  sickness, 
the  big,  ungainly  figure,  the  beaming  smile, 
and  the  shock  of  dark  hair  that  belonged  to 
nobody  else  in  the  world  but  John  Tenison. 
A  stony  chill  settled  about  her  heart  as  she 
went  up  the  steps  and  gave  him  her  hand. 

Oh,  if  he  only  couldn't  stay  to  dinner,  she 
prayed.  Oh,  if  only  he  could  spare  them 
time  for  no  more  than  a  flying  visit !  With 
a  sinking  heart  she  smiled  her  greetings. 

"Doctor  Tenison — this  is  very  nice  of 
you!'*  Margaret  said.  "Have  you  met  my 
father — my  small  brothers?" 

"We  have  been  having  a  great  talk," 
said  John  Tenison,  genially,  "and  this 
young  man" — he  indicated  Robert — "has 
been  showing  me  the  colored  supplement 
of  the  paper.  I  didn't  have  any  word  from 
you,  Miss  Paget,"  he  went  on,  "so  I  took 


MOTHER  161 

the  chance  of  finding  you.  And  your 
mother  has  assured  me  that  I  will  not  put 
her  out  by  staying  to  have  luncheon  with 
you." 

"Oh,  that's  nice!"  Margaret  said  me 
chanically,  trying  to  dislodge  Robert  from 
the  most  comfortable  chair  by  a  significant 
touch  of  her  fingers  on  his  small  shoulder. 
Robert  perfectly  understood  that  she 
wanted  the  chair,  but  continued  in  absorbed 
study  of  the  comic  supplement,  merely 
wriggling  resentfully  at  Margaret's  touch. 
Margaret,  at  the  moment,  would  have  been 
glad  to  use  violence  on  the  stubborn,  serene 
little  figure.  When  he  was  finally  dislodged, 
she  sat  down,  still  flushed  from  her  walk 
and  the  nervousness  Doctor  Tenison's  ar 
rival  caused  her,  and  tried  to  bring  the 
conversation  into  a  normal  channel.  But 
an  interruption  occurred  in  the  arrival  of 
Harry  and  Julie  in  the  runabout;  the  little 
boys  swarmed  down  to  examine  it.  Julie, 
very  pretty,  with  a  perceptible  little  new  air 


162  MOTHER 

of  dignity,  went  upstairs  to  freshen  hair 
and  gown,  and  Harry,  pushing  his  straw 
hat  back  the  better  to  mop  his  forehead, 
immediately  engaged  Doctor  Tenison's  at 
tention  with  the  details  of  what  sounded  to 
Margaret  like  a  particularly  uninteresting 
operation,  which  he  had  witnessed  the  day 
before. 

Utterly  discouraged,  and  acutely  wretched, 
Margaret  presently  slipped  away,  and  went 
into  the  kitchen,  to  lend  a  hand  with  the 
dinner  preparations  if  help  was  needed. 
The  room  presented  a  scene  if  possible  a 
little  more  confused  than  that  of  the  day 
before,  and  was  certainly  hotter.  Her 
mother,  flushed  and  hurried,  in  a  fresh  but 
rather  unbecoming  gingham,  was  putting 
up  a  cold  supper  for  the  younger  boys,  who, 
having  duly  attended  to  their  religious 
duties,  were  to  take  a  long  afternoon  tramp, 
with  a  possible  interval  of  fishing.  She 
buttered  each  slice  of  the  great  loaf  before 
she  cut  it,  and  lifted  it  carefully  on  the  knife 


MOTHER  163 

before  beginning  the  next  slice.  An  opened 
pot  of  jam  stood  at  her  elbow.  A  tin  cup 
and  the  boys'  fishing-gear  lay  on  a  chair. 
Theodore  and  Duncan  themselves  hung  over 
these  preparations;  never  apparently  help 
ing  themselves  to  food,  yet  never  with 
empty  mouths.  Blanche,  moaning  "The 
Palms"  with  the  insistence  of  one  who  wishes 
to  show  her  entire  familiarity  with  a  mel 
ody,  was  at  the  range. 

Roast  veal,  instead  of  the  smothered 
chickens  her  mother  had  so  often,  and 
cooked  so  deliciously,  a  mountain  of  mashed 
potato — corn  on  the  cob,  and  an  enormous 
heavy  salad  mantled  with  mayonnaise — 
Margaret  could  have  wept  over  the  hope 
lessly  plebeian  dinner! 

"Mother,  mayn't  I  get  down  the  finger- 
bowls,"  she  asked;  "and  mayn't  we  have 
black  coffee  in  the  silver  pot,  afterward?" 

Mrs.  Paget  looked  absently  at  her  for  a 
dubious  second.  "I  don't  like  to  ask 
Blanche  to  wash  all  that  extra  glass,"  she 


i64  MOTHER 

said,  in  an  undertone,  adding  briskly  to 
Theodore,  "No,  no,  Ted!  You  can't  have 
all  that  cake.  Half  that!"  and  to  Blanche 
herself,  "Don't  leave  the  door  open  when 
you  go  in,  Blanche;  I  just  drove  all  the  flies 
out  of  the  dining-room."  Then  she  re 
turned  to  Margaret  with  a  cordial:  "Why, 
certainly,  dear!  Any  one  who  wants  cof 
fee,  after  tea,  can  have  it!  Dad  always 
wants  his  cup  of  tea." 

"Nobody  but  us  ever  serves  tea  with 
dinner!"  Margaret  muttered;  but  her 
mother  did  not  hear  it.  She  buckled  the 
strap  of  the  lunch-box,  straightened  her 
back  with  an  air  of  relief,  and  pushed  down 
her  rolled-up  sleeves. 

"Don't  lose  that  napkin,  Ted,"  said  she, 
and  receiving  the  boy's  grateful  kiss  hap 
hazard  between  her  hair  and  forehead,  she 
added  affectionately:  "You're  more  than 
welcome,  dear!  We're  all  ready,  Mark — go 
and  tell  them,  dear!  All  right,  Blanche." 

Ruffled   and   angry,   Margaret  went   to 


MOTHER  165 

summon  the  others  to  dinner.  Maudie 
had  joined  them  on  the  porch  now,  and  had 
been  urged  to  stay,  and  was  already  trying 
her  youthful  wiles  on  the  professor. 

"Well,  he'll  have  to  leave  on  the  five 
o'clock!"  Margaret  reflected,  steeled  to 
bitter  endurance  until  that  time.  For  every 
thing  went  wrong,  and  dinner  was  one  long 
nightmare  for  her.  Professor  Tenison's 
napkin  turned  out  to  be  a  traycloth. 
Blanche,  asked  for  another,  disappeared  for 
several  minutes,  and  returned  without  it, 
to  whisper  in  Mrs.  Paget's  ear.  Mrs. 
Paget  immediately  sent  her  own  fresh  nap 
kin  to  the  guest.  The  incident,  or  some 
thing  in  their  murmured  conversation,  gave 
Rebecca  and  Maudie  "the  giggles."  There 
seemed  an  exhausting  amount  of  passing 
and  repassing  of  plates.  The  room  was 
hot,  the  supply  of  ice  insufficient.  Mr. 
Paget  dwelt  on  his  favorite  grievance — "the 
old  man  isn't  needed,  these  days.  They're 
getting  all  young  fellows  into  the  bank. 


166  MOTHER 

They  put  young  college  fellows  in  there  who 
are  getting  pretty  near  the  money  I  am — 
after  twenty-five  years!''  In  any  pause, 
Mrs.  Paget  could  be  heard,  patiently  dis 
suading  little  Robert  from  his  fixed  inten 
tion  of  accompanying  the  older  boys  on 
their  walk,  whether  invited  or  uninvited. 

John  Tenison  behaved  charmingly,  eating 
his  dinner  with  enjoyment,  looking  inter 
estedly  from  one  face  to  the  other,  sym 
pathetic,  alert,  and  amused.  But  Mar 
garet  writhed  in  spirit  at  what  he  must  be 
thinking. 

Finally  the  ice  cream,  in  a  melting  condi 
tion,  and  the  chocolate  cake,  very  sticky, 
made  their  appearance;  and  although  these 
were  regular  Sunday  treats,  the  boys  felt 
called  upon  to  cheer.  Julie  asked  her  mother 
in  an  audible  undertone  if  she  "ought"  to 
eat  cake.  Doctor  Tenison  produced  an  enor 
mous  box  of  chocolates,  and  Margaret  was 
disgusted  with  the  frantic  scramble  her 
brothers  made  to  secure  them. 


MOTHER  167 

"If  you're  going  for  a  walk,  dear,"  her 
mother  said,  when  the  meal  was  over, 
"you'd  better  go.  It's  almost  three  now." 

"I  don't  know  whether  we  will,  it's  so 
hot,"  Margaret  said,  in  an  indifferent  tone, 
but  she  could  easily  have  broken  into  dis 
heartened  tears. 

"Oh,  go,"  Julie  urged,  "it's  much  cooler 
out."  They  were  up  in  Margaret's  old 
room,  Mrs.  Paget  tying  a  big  apron  about 
Julie's  ruffled  frock,  preparatory  to  an  at 
tack  upon  the  demoralized  kitchen.  "We 
think  he's  lovely,"  the  little  matron  went 
on  approvingly.  "Don't  fall  in  love  with 
him,  Mark." 

"Why  not?"  Margaret  said  carelessly, 
pinning  on  her  hat. 

"Well,  I  don't  imagine  he's  a  marrying 
man,"  said  the  young  authority,  wisely. 
Margaret  flushed,  and  was  angry  at  herself 
for  flushing.  But  when  Mrs.  Paget  had 
gone  downstairs,  Julie  came  very  simply 
and  charmingly  over  to  her  sister,  and 


168  MOTHER 

standing  close  beside  her  with  embarrassed 
eyes  on  her  own  hand — very  youthful  in 
its  plain  ring — as  she  played  with  the  bureau 
furnishing,  she  said: 

"Mother  tell  you?" 

Margaret  looked  down  at  the  flushed 
face. 

"Are  you  sorry,  Ju?" 

"Sorry!"  The  conscious  eyes  flashed 
into  view.  "Sorry!"  Julie  echoed  in  as 
tonishment.  "Why,  Mark,"  she  said 
dreamily — there  was  no  affectation  of  ma 
turity  in  her  manner  now,  and  it  was  all  the 
more  impressive  for  that.  "Why,  Mark," 
said  she,  "it's — it's  the  most  wonderful 
thing  that  ever  happened  to  me!  I  think 
and  think" — her  voice  dropped  very  low — 
"of  holding  it  in  my  arms — mine  and 
Harry's,  you  know — and  of  its  little  face!" 

Margaret,  stirred,  kissed  the  wet  lashes. 

"Ju,  but  you're  so  young — you're  such  a 
baby  yourself!"  she  said. 

"And,    Mark,"    Julie    said,    unheeding, 


MOTHER  169 

"you  know  what  Harry  and  I  are  going  to 
call  her,  if  it's  a  girl?  Not  for  Mother,  for 
it's  so  confusing  to  have  two  Julias,  but  for 
you!  Because,"  her  arms  went  about  her 
sister,  "you've  always  been  such  a  darling 
to  me,  Mark!" 

Margaret  went  downstairs  very  thought 
fully,  and  out  into  the  silent  Sunday  streets. 
Where  they  walked,  or  what  they  talked  of, 
she  did  not  know.  She  knew  that  her  head 
ached,  and  that  the  village  looked  very 
commonplace,  and  that  the  day  was  very 
hot.  She  found  it  more  painful  than  sweet 
to  be  strolling  along  beside  the  big,  loose- 
jointed  figure,  and  to  send  an  occasional 
side  glance  to  John  Tenison's  earnest  face, 
which  wore  its  pleasantest  expression  now. 
Ah,  well,  it  would  be  all  over  at  five  o'clock, 
she  said  wearily  to  herself,  and  she  could 
go  home  and  lie  down  with  her  aching  head 
in  a  darkened  room,  and  try  not  to  think 
what  to-day  might  have  been.  Try  not  to 
think  of  the  dainty  little  luncheon  Annie 


170  MOTHER 

would  have  given  them  at  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt's, 
of  the  luxurious  choice  of  amusements  after 
ward:  motoring  over  the  lovely  country 
roads,  rowing  on  the  wide  still  water,  watch 
ing  the  tennis  courts,  or  simply  resting  in 
deep  chairs  on  the  sweep  of  velvet  lawn 
above  the  river. 

She  came  out  of  a  reverie  to  find  Doctor 
Tenison  glancing  calmly  up  from  his 
watch. 

"The  train  was  five  o'clock,  was  it?"  he 
said.  "I've  missed  it!" 

"Missed  it!"  Margaret  echoed  blankly. 
Then,  as  the  horrible  possibility  dawned 
upon  her,  "Oh,  no!" 

"Oh,  yes — bad  as  that!"  he  said,  laugh 
ing  at  her. 

Poor  Margaret,  fighting  despair,  strug 
gled  to  recover  herself. 

"Well,  I  thought  it  might  have  been  im 
portant  to  you!"  she  said,  laughing  quite 
naturally.  "There's  a  seven-six,  but  it 
stops  everywhere,  and  a  ten-thirty.  The 


MOTHER  171 

ten-thirty  is  best,  because  supper's  apt  to 
be  a  little  late." 

"The  ten-thirty/'  Doctor  Tenison  echoed 
contentedly.  Margaret's  heart  sank — five 
more  hours  of  the  struggle!  "But  perhaps 
that's  an  imposition,"  he  said.  "Isn't 
there  a  tea-room — isn't  there  an  inn  here 
where  we  could  have  a  bite?" 

"We  aren't  in  Berlin,"  Margaret  re 
minded  him  cheerfully.  "There's  a  hotel 
— but  Mother  would  never  forgive  me  for 
leading  any  one  there  !  No,  we'll  take  that 
little  walk  I  told  you  of,  and  Mother  will 
give  us  something  to  eat  later.  Perhaps 
if  we're  late  enough,"  she  added  to  herself, 
"we  can  have  just  tea  and  bread  and  jam 
alone,  after  the  others." 

Suddenly,  unreasonably,  she  felt  philo 
sophical  and  gay.  The  little  episode  of 
missing  the  train  had  given  her  the  old  dear 
feeling  of  adventure  and  comradeship  again. 
Things  couldn't  be  any  worse  than  they 
had  been  at  noon,  anyway.  The  experi- 


172  MOTHER 

ence  had  been  thoroughly  disenchanting. 
What  did  a  few  hours,  more  or  less,  matter! 
Let  him  be  disgusted  if  he  wanted  to,  she 
couldn't  help  it ! 

It  was  cooler  now,  the  level  late  shadows 
were  making  even  Weston  pretty.  They 
went  up  a  steep  shady  lane  to  the  old  grave 
yard,  and  wandered,  peacefully,  contentedly, 
among  the  old  graves.  Margaret  gathered 
her  thin  gown  from  contact  with  the  tangled, 
uncut  grass;  they  had  to  disturb  a  flock  of 
nibbling  sheep  to  cross  to  the  crumbling 
wall.  Leaning  on  the  uneven  stones  that 
formed  it,  they  looked  down  at  the  roofs 
of  the  village,  half  lost  in  tree-tops;  and 
listened  to  the  barking  of  dogs,  and  the 
shrill  voices  of  children.  The  sun  sank, 
lower,  lower.  There  was  a  feeling  of  dew 
in  the  air  as  they  went  slowly  home. 

When,  at  seven  o'clock,  they  opened  the 
gate,  they  found  on  the  side  porch  only 
Rebecca,  enchanting  in  something  pink  and 
dotted,  Mother,  and  Dad. 


MOTHER  173 

"Lucky  we  waited!"  said  Rebecca,  rising, 
and  signalling  some  wordless  message  to 
Margaret  that  required  dimples,  widened 
eyes,  compressed  lips,  and  an  expression 
of  utter  secrecy.  "Supper's  all  ready," 
she  added  casually. 

"Where  are  the  others?"  Margaret  said, 
experiencing  the  most  pleasant  sensation 
she  had  had  in  twenty-four  hours. 

"Ju  and  Harry  went  home,  Rob's  at 
George's,  boys  walking,"  said  Rebecca, 
briefly,  still  dimpling  mysteriously  with 
additional  information.  She  gave  Margaret 
an  eloquent  side  glance  as  she  led  the  way 
into  the  dining-room.  At  the  doorway 
Margaret  stopped,  astounded. 

The  room  was  hardly  recognizable  now. 
It  was  cool  and  delightful,  with  the  di 
minished  table  daintily  set  for  five.  The 
old  silver  candlesticks  and  silver  teapot 
presided  over  blue  bowls  of  berries  and  the 
choicest  of  Mother's  preserved  fruits.  Some 
one  had  found  time  to  put  fresh  parsley 


174  MOTHER 

about  the  Canton  platter  of  cold  meats, 
some  one  had  made  a  special  trip  to  Mrs. 
O'Brien's  for  the  cream  that  filled  the 
Wedgwood  pitcher.  Margaret  felt  tears 
press  suddenly  against  her  eyes. 

"Oh,  Beck!"  she  could  only  stammer 
when  the  sisters  went  into  the  kitchen  for 
hot  water  and  tea  biscuit. 

"Mother  did  it,"  said  Rebecca,  returning 
her  hug  with  fervor.  "She  gave  us  all  an 
awful  talking  to  after  you  left!  She  said 
here  was  dear  old  Mark,  who  always  worked 
herself  to  death  for  us,  trying  to  make  a 
nice  impression,  and  to  have  things  go 
smoothly,  and  we  were  all  acting  like 
Indians,  and  everything  so  confused  at 
dinner,  and  hot  and  noisy!  So,  later,  when 
Paul  and  I  and  the  others  were  walking,  we 
saw  you  and  Doctor  Tenison  going  up 
toward  the  graveyard,  and  I  tore  home  and 
told  Mother  he'd  missed  the  five  and  would 
be  back;  it  was  after  five  then,  and  we  just 
flew!" 


MOTHER  175 

It  was  all  like  a  pleasant  awakening  after 
a  troubled  dream.  As  Margaret  took  her 
place  at  the  little  feast  she  felt  an  exquisite 
sensation  of  peace  and  content  sink  into 
her  heart.  Mother  was  so  gracious  and 
charming,  behind  the  urn;  Rebecca  ir 
resistible  in  her  admiration  of  the  famous 
professor.  Her  father  was  his  sweetest 
self,  delightfully  reminiscent  of  his  boyhood, 
and  his  visit  to  the  White  House  in  Lincoln's 
day,  with  "my  uncle,  the  judge."  But  it 
was  to  her  mother's  face  that  Margaret's 
eyes  returned  most  often;  she  wanted — she 
was  vaguely  conscious  that  she  wanted — to 
get  away  from  the  voices  and  laughter,  and 
think  about  Mother.  How  sweet  she  was, 
just  sweet,  and  after  all,  how  few  people 
were  that  in  this  world !  They  were  clever, 
and  witty,  and  rich — plenty  of  them,  but 
how  little  sweetness  there  was!  How  few 
faces,  like  her  mother's,  did  not  show  a  line 
that  was  not  all  tenderness  and  goodness. 
They  laughed  over  their  teacups  like  old 


176  MOTHER 

friends;  the  professor  and  Rebecca  shouting 
joyously  together,  Mr.  Paget  one  broad 
twinkle,  Mrs.  Paget  radiantly  reflecting,  as 
she  always  did  reflect,  the  others'  mood. 
It  was  a  memorably  happy  hour. 

And  after  tea  they  sat  on  the  porch,  and 
the  stars  came  out,  and  presently  the  moon 
sent  silver  shafts  through  the  dark  foliage 
of  the  trees.  Little  Rob  came  home,  and 
climbed  silently,  contentedly,  into  his  father's 
lap. 

"Sing  something,  Mark,"  said  Dad,  then; 
and  Margaret,  sitting  on  the  steps  with  her 
head  against  her  mother's  knee,  found  it 
very  simple  to  begin  in  the  darkness  one  of 
the  old  songs  he  loved : 

"Don't  you  cry,  ma  honey, 
Don't  you  weep  no  more." 

Rebecca,  sitting  on  the  rail,  one  slender 
arm  flung  above  her  head  about  the  pillar, 
joined  her  own  young  voice  to  Margaret's 
sweet  and  steady  one.  The  others  hummed 


MOTHER  177 

a  little.  John  Tenison,  sitting  watching 
them,  his  locked  hands  hanging  between 
his  knees,  saw  in  the  moonlight  a  sudden 
glitter  on  the  mother's  cheek. 

Presently  Bruce,  tired  and  happy  and 
sunburned,  came  through  the  splashed 
silver-and-black  of  the  street  to  sit  by  Mar 
garet,  and  put  his  arm  about  her;  and  the 
younger  boys,  returning  full  of  the  day's 
great  deeds,  spread  themselves  comfortably 
over  the  lower  steps.  Before  long  all  their 
happy  voices  rose  together,  on  "Believe 
me,"  and  "Working  on  the  Railroad,"  and 
"Seeing  Nellie  Home,"  and  a  dozen  more  of 
the  old  songs  that  young  people  have  sung 
for  half  a  century  in  the  summer  moonlight. 

And  then  it  was  time  to  say  good-night 
to  Professor  Tenison.  "Come  again,  sir!" 
said  Mr.  Paget,  heartily;  the  boys  slid  their 
hands,  still  faintly  suggestive  of  fish,  cor 
dially  into  his;  Rebecca  promised  to  mail 
him  a  certain  discussed  variety  of  fern  the 
very  next  day;  Bruce's  voice  sounded  all 


178  MOTHER 

hearty    good-will    as    he    hoped    that    he 
wouldn't  miss  Doctor  Tenison' s  next  visit. 
Mrs.  Paget,  her  hand  in  his,  raised  keen,  al 
most  anxious  eyes  to  his  face. 

"But  surely  you'll  be  down  our  way 
again?"  said  she,  unsmilingly. 

"Oh,  surely."  The  professor  was  unable 
to  keep  his  eyes  from  moving  toward  Mar 
garet,  and  the  mother  saw  it. 

"Good-bye  for  the  present,  then,"  she 
said,  still  very  gravely. 

"Good-bye,  Mrs.  Paget,"  said  Doctor 
Tenison.  "  It's  been  an  inestimable  privilege 
to  meet  you  all.  I  haven't  ever  had  a  hap 
pier  day." 

Margaret,  used  to  the  extravagant 
speeches  of  another  world,  thought  this 
merely  very  charming  politeness.  But  her 
heart  sang  as  they  walked  away  together. 
He  liked  them — he  had  had  a  nice  time! 

"Now  I  know  what  makes  you  so  differ 
ent  from  other  women,"  said  John  Tenison, 
when  he  and  Margaret  were  alone.  "It's 


MOTHER  179 

having  that  wonderful  mother!  She — she 
— well,  she's  one  woman  in  a  million;  I  don't 
have  to  tell  you  that!  It's  something  to 
thank  God  for,  a  mother  like  that;  it's  a 
privilege  to  know  her.  I've  been  watching 
her  all  day,  and  I've  been  wondering  what 
she  gets  out  of  it — that  was  what  puzzled 
me;  but  now,  just  now,  I've  found  out! 
This  morning,  thinking  what  her  life  is,  I 
couldn't  see  what  repaid  her,  do  you  see  ? 
What  made  up  to  her  for  the  unending, 
unending  effort,  and  sacrifice,  the  pouring 
out  of  love  and  sympathy  and  help — year 
after  year  after  year.  .  .  ." 

He  hesitated,  but  Margaret  did  not 
speak. 

"You  know/'  he  went  on  musingly,  "in 
these  days,  when  women  just  serenely  ignore 
the  question  of  children,  or  at  most,  as  a 
special  concession,  bring  up  one  or  two — 
just  the  one  or  two  whose  expenses  can  be 
comfortably  met! — there's  something  mag 
nificent  in  a  woman  like  your  mother,  who 


1 8o  MOTHER 

begins  eight  destinies  instead  of  one!  She 
doesn't  strain  and  chafe  to  express  herself 
through  the  medium  of  poetry  or  music 
or  the  stage,  but  she  puts  her  whole  splen 
did  philosophy  into  her  nursery — launches 
sound  little  bodies  and  minds  that  have 
their  first  growth  cleanly  and  purely  about 
her  knees.  Responsibility — that's  what 
these  other  women  say  they  are  afraid  of! 
But  it  seems  to  me  there's  no  responsibility 
like  that  of  decreeing  that  young  lives 
simply  shall  not  be.  Why,  what  good  is 
learning,  or  elegance  of  manner,  or  pain 
fully  acquired  fineness  of  speech,  and  taste 
and  point  of  view,  if  you  are  not  going  to 
distil  it  into  the  growing  plants,  the  only 
real  hope  we  have  in  the  world !  You  know, 
Miss  Paget,"  his  smile  was  very  sweet  in 
the  half  darkness,  "there's  a  higher  tribunal 
than  the  social  tribunal  of  this  world,  after 
all;  and  it  seems  to  me  that  a  woman  who 
stands  there,  as  your  mother  will,  with  a 
forest  of  new  lives  about  her,  and  a  record 


MOTHER  181 

like  hers,  will — will  find  she  has  a  Friend  at 
court!"  he  finished  whimsically. 

They  were  at  a  lonely  corner,  and  a  gar 
den  fence  offering  Margaret  a  convenient 
support,  she  laid  her  arms  suddenly  upon 
the  rosevine  that  covered  it,  and  her  face 
upon  her  arms,  and  cried  as  if  her  heart 
was  broken. 

"Why,  why — my  dear  girl!"  the  profes 
sor  said,  aghast.  He  laid  his  hand  on  the 
shaking  shoulders,  but  Margaret  shook  it 
off. 

"I'm  not  what  you  think  I  am!"  she 
sobbed  out,  incoherently.  "I'm  not  differ 
ent  from  other  women;  I'm  just  as  selfish  and 
bad  and  mean  as  the  worst  of  them !  And 
I'm  not  worthy  to  t-tie  my  m-mother's 
shoes!" 

"Margaret!"  John  Tenison  said  un 
steadily.  And  in  a  flash  her  drooping  bright 
head  was  close  to  his  lips,  and  both  his 
big  arms  were  about  her.  "You  know  I 
love  you,  don't  you  Margaret?"  he  said 


182  MOTHER 

hoarsely,  over  and  over,  with  a  sort  of  fierce 
intensity.  "You  know  that,  don't  you? 
Don't  you,  Margaret?" 

Margaret  could  not  speak.  Emotion 
swept  her  like  a  rising  tide  from  all  her 
familiar  moorings;  her  heart  thundered, 
there  was  a  roaring  in  her  ears.  She  was 
conscious  of  a  wild  desire  to  answer  him, 
to  say  one  hundredth  part  of  all  she  felt; 
but  she  could  only  rest,  breathless,  against 
him,  her  frightened  eyes  held  by  the  eyes  so 
near,  his  arms  about  her. 

"You  do,  don't  you,  Margaret ?"  he  said 
more  gently.  "You  love  me,  don't  you? 
Don't  you?" 

And  after  a  long  time,  or  what  seemed  a 
long  time,  while  they  stood  motionless  in 
the  summer  night,  with  the  great  branches 
of  the  trees  moving  a  little  overhead,  and 
garden  scents  creeping  out  on  the  damp  air, 
Margaret  said,  with  a  sort  of  breathless 
catch  in  her  voice : 

"You  know  I  do!"    And  with  the  words 


MOTHER  183 

the  fright  left  her  eyes,  §nd  happy  tears 
filled  them,  and  she  raised  her  face  to  his. 

Coming  back  from  the  train  half  an  hour 
later,  she  walked  between  a  new  heaven  and 
a  new  earth!  The  friendly  stars  seemed 
just  overhead;  a  thousand  delicious  odors 
came  from  garden  beds  and  recently  wa 
tered  lawns.  She  moved  through  the  con 
fusion  that  always  attended  the  settling 
down  of  the  Pagets  for  the  night  like  one 
in  a  dream,  and  was  glad  to  find  herself  at 
last  lying  in  the  darkness  beside  the  sleep 
ing  Rebecca  again.  Now,  now,  she  could 
think! 

But  it  was  all  too  wonderful  for  reason 
able  thought.  Margaret  clasped  both  her 
hands  against  her  rising  heart.  He  loved 
her.  She  could  think  of  the  very  words  he 
had  used  in  telling  her,  over  and  over  again. 
She  need  no  longer  wonder  and  dream  and 
despair:  he  had  said  it.  He  loved  her,  had 
loved  her  from  the  very  first.  His  old  aunt 
suspected  it,  and  his  chum  suspected  it, 


1 84  MOTHER 

and  he  had  thought  Margaret  knew  it. 
And  beside  him  in  that  brilliant  career  that 
she  had  followed  so  wistfully  in  her  dreams, 
Margaret  saw  herself,  his  wife.  Young  and 
clever  and  good  to  look  upon — yes,  she  was 
free  to-night  to  admit  herself  all  these  good 
things  for  his  sake! — and  his  wife,5* mount 
ing  as  he  mounted  beside  the  one  man  in  the 
world  she  had  elected  to  admire  and  love. 
"Doctor  and  Mrs.  John  Tenison" — so  it 
would  be  written.  "  Doctor  Tenison's  wife  " 
— "This  is  Mrs.  Tenison" — she  seemed  al 
ready  to  hear  the  magical  sound  of  it ! 

Love — what  a  wonderful  thing  it  was! 
How  good  God  was  to  send  this  best  of  all 
gifts  to  her!  She  thought  how  it  belittled 
the  other  good  things  of  the  world.  She 
asked  no  more  of  life,  now;  she  was  loved  by 
a  good  man,  and  a  great  man,  and  she  was  to 
be  his  wife.  Ah,  the  happy  years  together 
that  would  date  fram  to-night — Margaret 
was  thrilling  already  to  their  delights. 
"For  better  or  worse/'  the  old  words  came 


MOTHER  185 

to  her  with  a  new  meaning.  There  would 
be  no  worse,  she  said  to  herself  with  sudden 
conviction — how  could  there  be?  Poverty, 
privation,  sickness  might  come — but  to 
bear  them  with  John — to  comfort  and  sus 
tain  him,  to  be  shut  away  with  him  from  all 
the  world  but  the  world  of  their  own  four 
walls — why,  that  would  be  the  greatest 
happiness  of  all!  What  hardship  could  be 
hard  that  knitted  their  two  hearts  closer  to 
gether;  what  road  too  steep  if  they  essayed 
it  hand  in  hand? 

And  that — her  confused  thoughts  ran  on 
— that  was  what  had  changed  all  life  for 
Julie.  She  had  forgotten  Europe,  forgotten 
all  the  idle  ambitions  of  her  girlhood,  be 
cause  she  loved  her  husband;  and  now  the 
new  miracle  was  to  come  to  her — the  miracle 
of  a  child,  the  little  perfect  promise  of  the 
days  to  come.  How  marvellous — how  mar 
vellous  it  was!  The  little  imperative,  help 
less  third  person,  bringing  to  radiant  youth 
and  irresponsibility  the  terrors  of  danger 


1 86  MOTHER 

and  anguish,  and  the  great  final  joy,  to 
share  together.  That  was  life.  Julie  was 
living;  and  although  Margaret's  own  heart 
was  not  yet  a  wife's,  and  she  could  not  yet 
find  room  for  the  love  beyond  that,  still  she 
was  strangely,  deeply  stirred  now  by  a  long 
ing  for  all  the  experiences  that  life  held. 

How  she  loved  everything  and  everybody 
to-night — how  she  loved  just  being  alive — 
just  being  Margaret  Paget,  lying  here  in  the 
dark  dreaming  and  thinking.  There  was  no 
one  in  the  world  with  whom  she  would 
change  places  to-night!  Margaret  found 
herself  thinking  of  one  woman  of  her  ac 
quaintance  after  another — and  her  own 
future,  opening  all  color  of  rose  before  her, 
seemed  to  her  the  one  enviable  path  through 
the  world. 

In  just  one  day,  she  realized  with  vague 
wonder,  her  slowly  formed  theories  had 
been  set  at  naught,  her  whole  philosophy 
turned  upside  down.  Had  these  years  of 
protest  and  rebellion  done  no  more  than 


MOTHER  187 

lead  her  in  a  wide  circle,  past  empty  gain, 
and  joyless  mirth,  and  the  dead  sea  fruit  of 
riches  and  idleness,  back  to  her  mother's 
knees  again  ?  She  had  met  brilliant  women, 
rich  women,  courted  women — but  where 
among  them  was  one  whose  face  had  ever 
shone  as  her  mother's  shone  to-day?  The 
overdressed,  idle  dowagers;  the  matrons, 
with  their  too-gay  frocks,  their  too-full  days, 
their  too-rich  food;  the  girls,  all  crudeness, 
artifice,  all  scheming  openly  for  their  own 
advantage — where  among  them  all  was  hap 
piness  ?  Where  among  them  was  one  whom 
Margaret  had  heard  say — as  she  has  heard 
her  mother  say  so  many,  many  times — 
"Children,  this  is  a  happy  day," — "Thank 
God  for  another  lovely  Sunday  all  together/' 

"Isn't  it  lovely  to  get  up  and  find  the  sun 
shining?"-— "Isn't  it  good  to  come  home 
hungry  to  such  a  nice  dinner?" 

And  what  a  share  of  happiness  her  mother 
had  given  the  world !  How  she  had  planned 
and  worked  for  them  all — Margaret  let  her 


1 88  MOTHER 

arm  fall  across  the  sudden  ache  in  her  eyes 
as  she  thought  of  the  Christmas  mornings, 
and  the  stuffed  stockings  at  the  fireplace 
that  proved  every  childish  wish  remem 
bered,  every  little  hidden  hope  guessed! 
Darling  Mother — she  hadn't  had  much 
money  for  those  Christmas  stockings,  they 
must  have  been  carefully  planned,  down  to 
the  last  candy  cane.  And  how  her  face 
would  beam,  as  she  sat  at  the  breakfast- 
table,  enjoying  her  belated  coffee,  after  the 
cold  walk  to  church,  and  responding  warmly 
to  the  onslaught  of  kisses  and  hugs  that 
added  fresh  color  to  her  cold,  rosy  cheeks! 
What  a  mother  she  was — Margaret  remem 
bered  her  making  them  all  help  her  clear 
up  the  Christmas  disorder  of  tissue  paper 
and  ribbons;  then  came  the  inevitable  bed 
making,  then  tippets  and  overshoes,  for  a 
long  walk  with  Dad.  They  would  come 
back  to  find  the  dining-room  warm,  the 
long  table  set,  the  house  deliciously  fragrant 
from  the  immense  turkey  that  their  mother, 


MOTHER  189 

a  fresh  apron  over  her  holiday  gown,  was 
basting  at  the  oven.  Then  came  the  feast, 
and  then  games  until  twilight,  and  more 
table-setting;  and  the  baby,  whoever  he 
was,  was  tucked  away  upstairs  before  tea, 
and  the  evening  ended  with  singing,  gath 
ered  about  Mother  at  the  piano. 

"How  happy  we  all  were!"  Margaret 
said;  "and  how  she  worked  for  us!" 

And  suddenly  theories  and  speculation 
ended,  and  she  knew.  She  knew  that  faith 
ful,  self-forgetting  service,  and  the  love  that 
spends  itself  over  and  over,  only  to  be  re 
newed  again  and  again,  are  the  secret  of 
happiness.  For  another  world,  perhaps 
leisure  and  beauty  and  luxury — but  in  this 
one,  "Who  loses  his  life  shall  gain  it." 
Margaret  knew  now  that  her  mother  was 
not  only  the  truest,  the  finest,  the  most 
generous  woman  she  had  ever  known,  but 
the  happiest  as  well. 

She  thought  of  other  women  like  her 
mother;  she  suddenly  saw  what  made  their 


MOTHER 

lives  beautiful.  She  could  understand  now 
why  Emily  Porter,  her  old  brave  little  asso 
ciate  of  school-teaching  days,  was  always 
bright,  why  Mary  Page,  plodding  home  from 
the  long  day  at  the  library  desk  to  her  little 
cottage  and  crippled  sister,  at  night,  always 
made  one  feel  the  better  and  happier  for 
meeting  her. 

Mrs.  Carr-Boldt's  days  were  crowded  to 
the  last  instant,  it  was  true;  but  what  a 
farce  it  was,  after  all,  Margaret  said  to  her 
self  in  all  honesty,  to  humor  her  in  her  little 
favorite  belief  that  she  was  a  busy  woman ! 
Milliner,  manicure,  butler,  chef,  club,  card- 
table,  tea-table — these  and  a  thousand 
things  like  them  filled  her  day,  and  they 
might  all  be  swept  away  in  an  hour,  and 
leave  no  one  the  worse.  Suppose  her  own 
summons  came;  there  would  be  a  little 
flurry  throughout  the  great  establishment, 
legal  matters  to  settle,  notes  of  thanks  to 
be  written  for  flowers.  Margaret  could 
imagine  Victoria  and  Harriet,  awed  but 


MOTHER  191 

otherwise  unaffected,  home  from  school  in 
midweek,  and  to  be  sent  back  before  the 
next  Monday.  Their  lives  would  go  on 
unchanged,  their  mother  had  never  buttered 
bread  for  them,  never  schemed  for  their 
boots  and  hats,  never  watched  their  work 
and  play,  and  called  them  to  her  knees  for 
praise  and  blame.  Mr.  Carr-Boldt  would 
have  his  club,  his  business,  his  yacht,  his 
motor-cars — he  was  well  accustomed  to  liv 
ing  in  cheerful  independence  of  family  claims. 

But  life  without  Mother !     In  a  sick 

moment  of  revelation  Margaret  saw  it. 
She  saw  them  gathering  in  the  horrible 
emptiness  and  silence  of  the  house  Mother 
had  kept  so  warm  and  bright,  she  saw  her 
father's  stooped  shoulders  and  trembling 
hands,  she  saw  Julie  and  Beck,  red-eyed, 
white-cheeked,  in  fresh  black — she  seemed 
to  hear  the  low-toned  voices  that  would 
break  over  and  over  again  so  cruelly  into 
sobs.  What  could  they  do — who  could  take 
up  the  work  she  laid  down — who  would 


i92  MOTHER 

watch  and  plan  and  work  for  them  all,  now? 
Margaret  thought  of  the  empty  place  at 
the  table,  of  the  room  that,  after  all  these 
years,  was  no  longer  "Mother's  room " 

Oh,  no — no — no! — She  began  to  cry  bit 
terly  in  the  dark.  No,  please  God,  they 
would  hold  her  safe  with  them  for  many 
years.  Mother  should  live  to  see  some  of 
the  fruits  of  the  long  labor  of  love.  She 
should  know  that  with  every  fresh  step  in 
life,  with  every  deepening  experience,  her 
children  grew  to  love  her  better,  turned  to 
her  more  and  more !  There  would  be  Christ- 
mases  as  sweet  as  the  old  ones,  if  not  so  gay; 
there  would  come  a  day — Margaret's  whole 
being  thrilled  to  the  thought — when  little 
forms  would  run  ahead  of  John  and  herself 
up  the  worn  path,  and  when  their  children 
would  be  gathered  in  Mother's  experienced 
arms!  Did  life  hold  a  more  exquisite  mo 
ment,  she  wondered,  than  that  in  which  she 
would  hear  her  mother  praise  them! 

All  her  old  castles  in  the  air  seemed  cheap 


MOTHER  193 

and  tinselled  tonight,  beside  these  tender 
dreams  that  had  their  roots  in  the  real 
truths  of  life.  Travel  and  position,  gowns 
and  motor-cars,  yachts  and  country  houses, 
these  things  were  to  be  bought  in  all  their 
perfection  by  the  highest  bidder,  and  always 
would  be.  But  love  and  character  and 
service,  home  and  the  wronderful  charge  of 
little  lives — the  "pure  religion  breathing 
household  laws"  that  guided  and  perfected 
the  whole — these  were  not  to  be  bought, 
they  were  only  to  be  prayed  for,  worked 
for,  bravely  won. 

"God  has  been  very  good  to  me,"  Mar 
garet  said  to  herself  very  seriously;  and  in 
her  old  childish  fashion  she  made  some  new 
resolves.  From  now  on,  she  thought,  with 
a  fervor  that  made  it  seem  half  accomplished, 
she  would  be  a  very  different  woman.  If 
joy  came,  she  would  share  it  as  far  as  she 
could;  if  sorrow,  she  would  show  her  mother 
that  her  daughter  was  not  all  unworthy  of 
her.  To-morrow,  she  thought,  she  would 


194  MOTHER 

go  and  see  Julie.  Dear  old  Ju,  whose  heart 
was  so  full  of  the  little  Margaret!  Mar 
garet  had  a  sudden  tender  memory  of  the 
days  when  Theodore  and  Duncan  and  Rob 
were  all  babies  in  turn.  Her  mother  would 
gather  the  little  daily  supply  of  fresh  clothes 
from  bureau  and  chest  every  morning,  and 
carry  the  little  bath-tub  into  the  sunny 
nursery  window,  and  sit  there  with  only  a 
bobbing  downy  head  and  waving  pink  fin 
gers  visible  from  the  great  warm  bundle  of 
bath  apron.  .  .  .  Ju  would  be  doing 
that  now. 

And  she  had  sometimes  wished,  or  half 
formed  the  wish,  that  she  and  Bruce  had 
been  the  only  ones!  Yes,  came  the  sud 
den  thought,  but  it  wouldn't  have  been 
Bruce  and  Margaret,  after  all,  it  would  have 
been  Bruce  and  Charlie. 

Good  God!  That  was  what  women  did, 
then,  when  they  denied  the  right  of  life 
to  the  distant,  unwanted,  possible  little 
person!  Calmly,  constantly,  in  all  placid 


MOTHER  195 

philosophy  and  self-justification,  they  kept 
from  the  world — not  only  the  troublesome 
new  baby,  with  his  tears  and  his  illnesses, 
his  merciless  exactions,  his  endless  claim  on 
mind  and  body  and  spirit — but  perhaps  the 
glowing  beauty  of  a  Rebecca,  the  buoyant 
indomitable  spirit  of  a  Ted,  the  sturdy  charm 
of  a  small  Robert,  whose  grip  on  life,  whose 
energy  and  ambition  were  as  strong  as 
Margaret's  own! 

Margaret  stirred  uneasily,  frowned  in  the 
dark.  It  seemed  perfectly  incredible,  it 
seemed  perfectly  impossible  that  if  Mother 
had  had  only  the  two — and  how  many 
thousands  of  women  didn't  have  that! — 
she,  Margaret,  a  pronounced  and  separate 
entity,  travelled,  ambitious,  and  to  be  the 
wife  of  one  of  the  world's  great  men,  might 
not  have  been  lying  here  in  the  summer 
night,  rich  in  love  and  youth  and  beauty  and 
her  dreams! 

It  was  all  puzzling,  all  too  big  for  her  to 
understand.  But  she  could  do  what  Mother 


196  MOTHER 

did,  just  take  the  nearest  duty  and  fulfil  it, 
and  sleep  well,  and  rise  joyfully  to  fresh  effort. 

Margaret  felt  as  if  she  would  never  sleep 
again.  The  summer  night  was  cool,  she 
was  cramped  and  chilly;  but  still  her  thoughts 
raced  on,  and  she  could  not  shut  her  eyes. 
She  turned  and  pressed  her  face  resolutely 
into  the  pillow,  and  with  a  great  sigh  re 
nounced  the  joys  and  sorrows,  the  lessons  and 
the  awakening  that  the  long  day  had  held. 

A  second  later  there  was  a  gentle  rustle 
at  the  door. 

"Mark,"  a  voice  whispered.  "Can't 
you  sleep?" 

Margaret  locked  her  arms  tight  about  her 
mother,  as  the  older  woman  knelt  beside  her. 

"Why,  how  cold  you  are,  sweetheart!" 
her  mother  protested,  tucking  covers  about 
her.  "I  thought  I  heard  you  sigh!  I  got 
up  to  lock  the  stairway  door:  Baby's  gotten 
a  trick  of  walking  in  his  sleep  when  he's 
overtired.  It's  nearly  one  o'clock,  Mark! 
What  have  you  been  doing?" 


MOTHER  197 

"Thinking/'  Margaret  put  her  lips  very 

close  to  her  mother's  ear.  "  Mother "  she 

stammered  and  stopped.  Mrs.  Paget  kissed 
her. 

"Daddy  and  I  thought  so,"  she  said  sim 
ply;  and  further  announcement  was  not 
needed.  "  My  darling  little  girl ! "  she  added 
tenderly;  and  then,  after  a  silence,  "He  is 
very  fine,  Mark,  so  unaffected,  so  gentle 
and  nice  with  the  boys.  I — I  think  I'm 
glad,  Mark.  I  lose  my  girl,  but  there's  no 
happiness  like  a  happy  marriage,  dear." 

"No,  you  won't  lose  me,  Mother,"  Mar 
garet  said,  clinging  very  close.  "We  hadn't 
much  time  to  talk,  but  this  much  we  did 
decide.  You  see,  John — John  goes  to  Ger 
many  for  a  year,  next  July.  So  we  thought 
— in  June  or  July,  Mother,  just  as  Julie's 
was!  Just  a  little  wedding  like  Ju's.  You 
see,  that's  better  than  interrupting  the 
term,  or  trying  to  settle  down,  when  we'd 
have  to  move  in  July.  And,  Mother,  I'm 
going  to  write  Mrs.  Carr-Boldt — she  can  get 


198  MOTHER 

a  thousand  girls  to  take  my  place,  her  niece 
is  dying  to  do  it ! — and  I'm  going  to  take  my 
old  school  here  for  the  term.  Mr.  Forbes 
spoke  to  me  about  it  after  church  this  morn 
ing;  they  want  me  back.  I  want  this  year 
at  home;  I  want  to  see  more  of  Bruce  and 
Ju,  and  sort  of  stand  by  darling  little  Beck ! 
But  it's  for  you,  most  of  all,  Mother/'  said 
Margaret,  with  difficulty.  "I've  always 
loved  you,  Mother,  but  you  don't  know  how 

wonderful  I  think  you  are "  She  broke 

off  pitifully,  "Ah,  Mother!" 

For  her  mother's  arms  had  tightened 
convulsively  about  her,  and  the  face  against 
her  own  was  wet. 

"Are  you  talking?"  said  Rebecca,  rearing 
herself  up  suddenly,  with  a  web  of  bright 
hair  falling  over  her  shoulder.  "You  said 
your  prayers  on  Mark  last  night,"  said  she, 
reproachfully;  "come  over  and  say  them  on 
me  to-night,  Mother." 

THE    END 


STORIES   OF    RARE    CHARM    BY 

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"The  Harvester,"  David  Langston,  is 
a  man  of  the  woods  and  fields,  who  draws 
his  living  from  the  prodigal  hand  of  Mother 
Nature  herself.  If  the  book  had  nothing  in 
it  but  the  splendid  figure  of  this  man,  with 
his  sure  grip  on  life,  his  superb  optimism, 
and  his  almost  miraculous  knowledge  of 
nature  secrets,  it  would  be  notable.  But 
when  the  Girl  comes  to  his  "Medicine 
Woods,"  and  the  Harvester's  whole  sound, 
healthy,  large  outdoor  being  realizes  that 
this  is  the  highest  point  of  life  which  has 
come  to  him  — there  begins  a  romance, 
troubled  and  interrupted,  yet  of  the  rarest  idyllic  quality. 

FRECKLES.       Decorations  by  E.  Stetson  Crawford 

Freckles  is  a  nameless  waif  when  the  tale  opens,  but  the  way  in 
which  he  takes  hold  of  life;  the  nature  friendships  he  forms  in  the 
great  Limberlost  Swamp;  the  manner  in  which  eveiyone  who  meets 
Him  succumbs  to  the  charm  of  his  engaging  personality;  and  his  love- 
story  with  "The  Angel"  are  full  of  real  sentiment. 

A  GIRL  OF  THE  LIMBERLOST. 

Illustrated  by  Wladyslaw  T.  Brenda. 

The  stoi 
type  of 

kindness  towards  all 
sheer  beauty  of  her  soul,  and  the  purity  of  her  vision,  she  wins  from 
barren  and  unpromising  surroundings  tnose  rewards  of  high  courage. 

It  is  an  inspiring  story  of  a  life  worth  while  and  the  rich  beauties 
of  the  out-of-doors  are  strewn  through  all  its  pages. 

AT  THE  FOOT  OF  THE  RAINBOW. 

Illustrations  in  colors  by  Oliver  Kemp. 
Ralph  Fletcher  Seymour. 


Design  and  decorations  by 


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Indiana.  The  story  is  one  of  devoted  friendship,  and  tender  self- 
sacrificing  love;  the  friendship  that  gives  freely  without  return,  and 
the  love  that  seeks  first  the  happiness  of  the  object.  The  novel  is 
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m  One  of  the  best  stories  of  life  in  a  girl's  college  that  has  ever  been 
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REBECCA  OF  SUNNYBROQK    FARM,       By   Kate  Douglas 
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LOCKE,   WILLIAM  J. 

The  Morals  of  Marcus 
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The  Hon.   Senator  Sage-Brush 

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The  Yellow  Ticket 

PACKARD,   FRANK  L. 
The  Miracle  Man 

PAINE,  RALPH  D. 

The    Fugitive    Freshman 

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Laddie 

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Bobbie,  General  Manager 
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A  Romance  of  Billy-Goat  Hill 

SERVICE— DANA 

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SETON,  ERNEST  THOMPSON 

Wild  Animals   at  Home 

SHIPMAN,  NELL 
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Uncle    Jeremiah    at    the    Panama- 
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Life    (Novelized   from   the  Play) 

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Daddy-Long-Legs 

WIGGIN,  KATE  DOUGLAS 
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